Beauty, fashion businesses turn out for Breast Cancer Alliance luncheon

Local and international beauty and fashion businesses joined forces Wednesday, Oct. 24, at Westchester Country Club in Harrison for “Club Pink: Your Fight is Our Fight,” the Greenwich-based Breast Cancer Alliance’s 28^th annual Luncheon and Fashion Show.

“Life has a way of leading us where we are meant to be,” said BCA President Karen Colella, who said she never imagined she’d be addressing a group of 850 women (and a number of men) as a two-time survivor of breast cancer, a disease that will affect one in eight women — and one in 800 men — that is increasingly afflicting women under the age of 50. “I know firsthand the fear and anxiety that comes with it. I also know the strength that comes from being part of a community.”

On Oct. 24, that community included keynote speaker Clea Shearer, co-founder of The Home Edit, a home organizing business featured on Netflix and YouTube as well as in books. She wasn’t there to talk about home editing, however, but rather health advocacy, which became a mission for her when in February 2022 at age 40 she found a lump in her right breast and was told by her gynecologist’s office that the doctor was booked until May. Sensing the urgency of the moment, she called her primary care physician and eventually wound up at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in her hometown of Nashville, where tests led doctors to discover not one but two tumors as well as cancer in her lymph nodes. With stage two breast cancer, she’s had six surgeries, including a double mastectomy, with a seventh upcoming. She takes oral chemotherapy twice a day.

But as a wife and mother of two daughters, Shearer is fine with all that, she said, as she plans on living and continuing to champion women standing up for their health needs.

BCA was founded in 1996 by one such woman, Mary Waterman, as she was living with terminal breast cancer. (She died the following year.) Over the course of those 28 years since, BCA has raised $36 million to support research, education, outreach and mammograms for the underserved.

On Oct. 24, Waterman was remembered by Melissa Beste, global CEO of Swiss luxury fashion brand Akris, whose sleek styles graced the runway in a show that BCA presented in collaboration with fashion partner Richards, the Greenwich women’s and men’s clothing and accessories store that has been teaming with the nonprofit for 18 years. (Richards always gives each attendee a gift card worth at least $100.)

Once again, Scott Mitchell – who formerly headed women’s clothing and jewelry at the family-owned Richards and now runs the five West Coast stores – served as the smooth auctioneer for prizes that included a trip to Paris featuring Akris fashions and tickets to a Taylor Swift “Eras Tour” concert in Toronto. (The silent auction ends Friday, Oct. 25.)

The cocktail reception was sponsored by Ripe juicery and Empire Merchants, with white chocolate from Dylan’s Candy Bar, floral centerpieces by b floral and complimentary skincare products by Avène, which specializes in helping restore the skin of cancer survivors, and Laura Mercier.

Warren Tricomi Salon again did hair and makeup for the 12 feisty “Models of Inspiration,” breast cancer survivors like Colella who strutted their stuff to “Eye of the Tiger” and other fight songs spun by DJ April Larken.

They made you feel as if you could take on the world.