How Mackay models made their New York Fashion Week dreams come true
Fluer Higley and Shantelle Blair will have their fashion dreams come true on a ‘once in a lifetime’ trip to walk the New York Fashion Week runway. Find out how they’re getting there.
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While many have dreamt of strutting the New York Fashion Week runway, two Mackay teenagers will soon make that dream a reality.
Fluer Higley and Shantelle Blair are two of 20 aspiring Australian models travelling to the United States this September on the trip of a lifetime.
The Model Experience tour is the brainchild of fashion boutique Belle Le Chic co-owners and mother-daughter duo Jasmine and Isabelle Kratz, who partnered with runway production company hiTechMODA.
The girls will fly out to photo shoots in Hawaii, walk the runway in New York, and finish with a stopover at Disneyland in Los Angeles.
From Aladdin on Broadway to baseball at Yankee Stadium, the tour offers young models and their families the opportunity to sightsee as well as jump-start their careers.
Fluer started modelling after meeting a friend in school who took classes at Brook Lee Modelling.
“I had a new friend in high school that was doing it and I thought it’d be cool to give it a go,” the 17 year old said.
“After doing more competitions and photo shoots, I was like, yeah, I want to keep doing it.”
The St Patricks College year 12 student said she knew at least six models from the Mackay region going on the tour who “all want to know what their dresses look like”.
Fluer’s grandmother Deb Dennis will join her on the tour and reminded her granddaughter that “modelling is when they give you a dress to wear if you like it or not”.
Deb is one of about 35 family members accompanying the models on the trip.
“Poor old Nan will be trying to keep up with everybody,” Deb said with a laugh.
She said her granddaughter reminded her of Australian model and beauty queen Jennifer Hawkins and that the tour was a “pretty exciting” opportunity.
“She’s a lovely girl inside and out. I’m really excited about the future for her,” she said.
Shantelle Blair, in year 10 at Mirani State High School, started modelling classes when she “just really wanted to build more confidence”.
The 15 year old said Fluer was one of her first friends at Brook Lee Modelling and she had “met most of the girls from other competitions as well”.
“It’s a massive group that we’re going to be with … I’m very excited to meet all the other girls from around Australia (and) meet new friends,” Shantelle said.
Her parents Kristy and Clayton Blair would also go on what would be their daughter’s first time out of the country.
“It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity and I just couldn’t put a price on it,” Kristy said.
“We couldn’t not go.”
Kristy said Shantelle had met the Belle Le Chic co-owners buying gowns for modelling competitions and was thrilled to hear she had been selected for the tour.
“(Jasmine) said they selected them from a good supportive group of girls that would support each other and be there for each other,” she said.
“Being in a foreign country and everything, it can be a bit daunting.”
A young model and modelling coach herself, Isabelle Kratz travelled with her mum Jasmine to walk the New York runway for hiTechMODA in 2020 and they soon identified an opportunity.
“(Isabelle) hasn’t stopped dreaming about going back since she had that experience and, as a modelling teacher, she wanted to share that experience with other young models,” Jasmine said.
“The experience that we’re taking these girls on, we have already done personally, but just on our own.”
Travel and its trials are common for a professional model, so the tour is designed to be half sightseeing trip and half fashion week crash course.
As a digital marketing specialist with her business Inspired Impact, Jasmine has included website and logo design as part of the tour.
“Not only do they get to walk on the runways, they get to keep the outfits, (but) they get to come home with a whole PR package,” she said.
“Navigating that whole experience of how to deal with the media and backstage and how to put your best foot forward online … that whole experience is what we’ve packaged up.”
Jasmine and Isabelle started their fashion boutique in the Whitsundays before relocating to Caloundra.
This will be Belle Le Chic’s first ever Model Experience tour and both co-owners were looking forward to September.
“We’ve got a really amazing group and they all are from all different walks of life and all different places in Australia,” Jasmine said.
“We’ll come together and it will be a group of Australian models hitting the New York runways.”
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