From the [UK] Telegraph, the [UK] Daily Mail, the [UK] Sun, and the [UK] Metro:

Office worker Kelly Knox, 24, who was born without a left forearm, wins the televised competition for Britain’s Missing Top Model on BBC3. Knox was subsequently awarded a Marie Claire magazine photo shoot and a modeling contract.

Promoters for the show said it aimed to change perceptions of beauty by searching for a model with a disability in an industry where people with disabilities are often excluded.

Knox was born with her condition, and decided to stop wearing a prosthetic when she was seven years old. “In my household we don’t use the word disabled. Never have done, never will do,” Knox said. “I don’t feel disabled but society will label me as being disabled.”

Marie Claire editor Marie O’Riordan said: “To get disability discussed on the sofas throughout the land is no mean feat and using a popular format of a reality show was a clever way of seducing viewers into a more complex world.

“We hope this does pave the way for girls with disabilities to get into modeling in the future.”

(Marie Claire photo in the Daily Mail)

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 30th, 2008 at 8:16 am and is filed under limb loss, media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.  Email This Post