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Event Date: Dec 16, 2007
Project Frumway is Back!
CENTRAL, HAFTR, HANC, and SKA NCSY Jump Clubs come together once more for the second annual Project Frumway, a fashion event featuring clothing from Be Precious Clothing as well as boutiques in the five towns and Queens. The event will be held on March 16th, from 7:30-10:00 pm at Beth Sholom in Lawrence, NY. To purchase tickets ($18-$21) call 516-569-6279 or visit the Be Precious Fashion Blog.
Press from Last Year’s Frumway:
New York Jewish Week
Models sauntered down the runway in all the latest styles, from florals to dip-dye, dropped-waist dresses and pencil skirts to jumpers. While all the latest trends were represented, this wasn’t your typical fashion show. All the models were smiling, looking healthy, not emaciated - and there were no pants in sight.
This was Project Frumway, a joint program from the girls’ division of Long Island NCSY, the Hebrew Academy of the Five Towns, Hebrew Academy of Nassau County, Stella K. Abraham High School and the new family-run clothing company Be Precious. Taking their cues from the highly successful Bravo television show, the event invited elementary and high school girls to submit designs for an outfit they would like to see on the runway. The Be Precious runway show featured the company’s spring collection as well as the four winning designs chosen from over 500 submissions.
As Heidi Klum often reminds Project Runway viewers and contestants, “In fashion, one day you’re in and the next day you’re out.” The same is true for high school, beginning an emotional and spiritual journey to adulthood. Girls experiment with their identity, their friends and especially their style in ways that will make them cool one day and an outcast the next.
The pressure on teen girls is especially acute in the frum community, where an interest in fashion is more often than not trumped by being in accordance with the laws of tzniut, or modesty. Josh Ligett, president of Be Precious, wants to change that perception.
“The point is that being tznius doesn’t mean you’re shlumpy; it means you’re beautiful,” he said. “I wanted to make it easier for people, so people don’t have to start lengthening hemlines, altering what they buy to be tznius.”
Sheri Seidenfeld, who coordinated Project Frumway along with Elissa Schertz, agreed. “We want to bring tznius to girls on the fence,” she said. “We want to show them that you can be modest and cool and fashionable.”
The walls of the lobby at Congregation Beth Sholom in Lawrence, where the event was held, were plastered with submissions from budding designers, incorporating vests, ruffles, beading, pleats, belts and capes. Some drawings looked as if they came from Garment District design studios.
While only four designs were featured in the fashion show, Ligett was so impressed with some of the submissions that a few girls were told they might still get a call about using their designs for Be Precious in the future.
The message of self-confidence and positive self-esteem that Seidenfeld and Schertz wanted the event to carry made it into every aspect of the show. The two women guided a group of six adolescent girls through the process of creating the event, making phone calls, raising money and setting up the raffles.
“We showed them that they’re a lot more capable than they thought they were,” Schertz said. “The success of this event is directly connected to their hard work.”
As the show began, the ballroom at Congregation Beth Sholom was packed shoulder-to-shoulder with girls and women eager to see what the novice designers had come up with. Younger girls sat themselves right at the edge of the runway to get a better view. The disc jockey kept happy, up-tempo music bouncing from the speakers as the models, of all shapes and sizes, ranging from nursery-age through high school, paraded down the catwalk in wrap dresses, jumpers and sportswear-inspired separates, topped off with hats, chunky necklaces and beaded belts. Friends and family called out the models’ names like paparazzi trying to get the attention of Hollywood A-listers.
The winners’ designs were sprinkled among the flowers and polka dots of Be Precious outfits. Model Tali Friedman, a ninth grader at HAFTR, wore a brown faux-wrap dress with gold-button detail and an animal print shell designed by Madison Schechter, a sixth grader at HALB.
“I thought of it myself,” said the giddy 11-year-old. “I liked the colors.” Schechter had dreams of being a fashion designer even before the contest.
Nicole Goldstein came down the runway in a blue terry hooded dress, accented by a contrasting plaid belt, hood and cuffs, by the design team of Lauren Hoffman and Jordana Todfeld, ninth graders at HAFTR. While Todfeld, who came up with the original rough sketch for the dress, was otherwise engaged for the evening, Hoffman said she was very pleased with the result of their collaboration.
“I loved it. It looked really flattering,” she said. “We wanted a great dress for everyday wear that’s comfortable and cute.”
Blima Fein, a 14-year-old ninth grader at SKA, designed the brown suspender dress with red buttons and an off-white T-shirt that Yaara Sandowski, an SKA 10th grader, wore.
“I looked in my closet, and got my inspiration from there,” Fein said. She saw her outfit as an alternative to plain, run-of-the-mill skirts. “The buttons really bring it together.”
The final winner was Michal Hubert, who designed a black tuxedo-inspired dress worn by Eliana Brecher, a 12th grader at SKA.“I’ve seen this look in fashion a lot lately,” Hubert said. “I wanted to make it my own.”
Just then, her mother came by, very excited for her daughter’s success. Her talented 11-year-old, her mother said, is on her way to the Fashion Institute of Technology, the school that launched many Project Runway contestants and leading designers such as Reem Acra, Carolina Herrera, Michael Kors and Nanette Lepore.
Hubert has support from Ligett of Be Precious. “If any of the winners want to go to fashion school, I’ll give them a recommendation,” Ligett said.
Seidenfeld and Schertz are hoping to make the fashion competition and runway show an annual event to parallel the boys’ division basketball tournament. They’d like to bring in different clothing companies each year, to show generations of frum women fun, funky and fashionable options within the guidelines of Torah values.
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