Photographer: Paul ShootMeNYCmodels Walker IG @shootmenycmodels
AS FASHION WEEK APPROACHES, MODEL’S CLEAN WATER ADVOCACY SET TO STEAL SPOTLIGHT
Supermodel Georgie Badiel To Launch Eponymous Foundation To Develop Clean Water and Sanitation In Burkina Faso.
Fashion Avenue News Magazine had the opportunity to attend the Models For Water Fundraising event with SuperModel Georgie Badiel. Numerous celebrities were in attendance such as Fashion Week Designer Zang Toi, classically trained opera singer/model/designer RADMILLA LOLLY, Supermodel Princess Adex and many more. Photographer for the evening was Paul Walker, supplied by Fashion Avenue News magazine.
opera singer/model/designer RADMILLA LOLLY (Photo: Pau; Walker)
Georgie hails from Burkina Faso in Africa, Georgie Badiel is a former Miss Burkina Faso and Miss Africa in 2004. After a successful debut walking for Jasper Conran, Duro Olowu and Ben de Lisi in 2007, Georgie signed with MUSE Management in New York in 2008, hitting the runway for Diane Von Furstenburg, Marc Jacobs, Issey Miyake, Louis Vuitton and Chado Ralph Rucci in New York and Paris. Signaling her rise as one of the industry’s top models and a leading face in the continued emergence of top models from Africa, Georgie was selected as Model Of The Year in 2012 by ARISE, the magazine that CNN called ‘Africa’s Fashion Bible.’
Sofia Davis, Editor-in-Chief of Fashion Avenue News is PROUD to have had Georgie as a Cover Model, as well as being her “OFFICIAL GODMOTHER”. We are very happy to work with such a wonderful, humble Supermodel and want to let everyone know about Models for Water.
Georgie Badiel
Water. A natural resource so accessible and prevalent for us in the USA that we hardly give it a second thought. In fact, the mere turn of a faucet handle or twist of a bottle cap gives us access to such an unlimited and cheap supply of water that we use and waste millions of gallons annually without ever consciously thinking about it, how we derive it or what our lives would be like without it.
Sadly however, for many around the world, life without access to clean water is a grim reality. For them, water is a precious item that’s difficult to get, often in very short supply and in a very real way, the difference between living and dying. As the world gets ready then, to focus its global media spotlight on New York City’s Fall Fashion Week in September, supermodel Georgie Badiel is using that platform to launch the GEORGIE BADIEL FOUNDATION, a non profit organization whose mission is to provide access to clean drinking water, wells and sanitation for the people of her homeland Burkina Faso and for similarly affected people on the continent of Africa as a whole. Additionally, the Foundation seeks to kickstart Nature’s rain making cycle by planting trees which will also help provide shade and root structures that help retain the viable soil that;s necessary to plant crops.
Georgie’s passion and drive to create change stems from her memory of the hardships she endured as a young girl going to get water for her family and the fact that the same situations exist today, more than twenty years later, for young girls all over Africa. This lack also creates deeper, more lasting problems ranging from personal health issues to a lack of education among young girls whose parents need them to get water daily rather than attend classes to obtain an education. Her story (seen on the Foundation website http://www.georgiebadielfoundation.org) is a compelling one and has already begun to raise awareness about her efforts and ideas to bring solutions to the problems that exist.
Even prior to launch, support has been committed from a variety of private and corporate entities including the phenomenal, classically trained opera singer/model/designer RADMILLA LOLLY who will give a private performance at the launch, MAJOR MODELS, DUCA SARTORIA, MACDELLA COOPER, THE SEGAL FAMILY FOUNDATION, ZANG TOI, GREYLOCK CAPITAL MANAGEMENT, KAMASUTRA VODKA,VOGA ITALIA and others, with many already working along with the Foundation to develop long term initiatives to ensure consistent funding.
(left to right: Editor, Sofia Davis; Designer, Zang Toi, Major Model CEO, Supermodel Princess Adex – Photo: Paul Walker)
“The people of Burkina Faso have been waiting all their lives for this,” says Georgie. “I want to make their dreams a reality.”
ABOUT THE GEORGIE BADIEL FOUNDATION – http://www.georgiebadielfoundation.org
The Georgie Badiel Foundation was founded and launched in 2015 as the evolved platform of a previous organization Georgie co-founded called MODELS FOR WATER. GBF’s mandate is to provide access to clean drinking water, wells and sanitation for the citizens of Burkina Faso in Africa which can then help put an end to diseases and social ills which thrive in a water deficient environment.
Seeing the devastating effects that the lack of water can have on a village, a people and a nation, Georgie is a strong advocate of the responsibility for developed countries, corporations and capable individuals to do their part to help provide this most basic of human needs. The Foundation is headquartered in New York and seeks to use technology, social lifestyle opportunities and artistic ventures to raise the funding needed to achieve its goals.
FASHION AVENUE NEWS MAGAZINE 