MANILA, Philippines—A model with Down syndrome will be walking the runway of New York Fashion Week this 2015, an E Online! report said.
Jamie Brewer, an actress of the television series “American Horror Story,” will be the first woman with Down syndrome to grace the event in a dress made by popular designer Carrie Hammer.
“Young girls and even young women … [see me] and say ‘hey, if she can do it so can I,’” Brewer was quoted in the report as saying.
The report said Brewer, an advocate for people with disabilities, was modeling as part of Hammer’s “Role Models Not Runway Models,” a campaign that the designer started during the 2014 Fashion Week.
Hammer usually chooses powerful women to be the models of her clothes.
Hammer remembered a touching email she received from Katie Driscoll, cofounder of the organization “Changing the Face of Beauty,” who encouraged her to put an inspiring woman with a disability on the runway and to be the model of her clothes.
The designer then asked Driscoll to suggest a good model for her clothes.
Driscoll, whose daughter is also suffering from Down syndrome, suggested Brewer.
When Hammer finally decided to include Brewer as a model, Driscoll sent an email saying, “Thank you for being the change that is long overdue. I could literally cry every time I read an article talking about your decision to include a model who just happens to have a disability! You are what this world needed!”
According to the report, Hammer is coming up with a dress inspired by the “American Horror Story,” where Brewer was an actress.
“’American Horror Story’ is dark, scary, bewitching so we had to go with black and Jamie has a beautiful body with a teeny waist and curves and we went with an A-line,” Hammer was quoted in the report. NC