How Hair & Care Project Is Making Fashion Week Accessible At Last
We speak to founder Anna Cafone about the catalyst behind the organization and how it supports blind and low-vision guests.
For many of us, the biggest concerns surrounding fashion week are things like what outfit we’re going to wear or whether we’re going to make it to the show on time. For blind and low-vision guests, however, there’s much more to think about. Hair & Care is a Hackney-based non-profit organization that aims to support blind and low-vision people in the fashion industry.
Founded in 2019, the organization started as a result of founder Anna Cofone’s experience of growing up with a blind parent. “My father was always deeply passionate about clothes, styling, and how he presented himself, even as he gradually lost sight. This is really what inspired the inception of Hair & Care,” Cofone tells us. “In an industry that is largely inaccessible to blind and low-vision people, I wanted to create a space where women and girls in this community can feel seen, empowered and confident in themselves,” she continues.
Fast forward by four years, and Hair & Care has supported over 300 blind and low-vision women, along with activating at fashion weeks across the globe. From teaming up with Sinead O’Dwyer in Copenhagen (and supporting the first blind guest to walk the runway) to working on three shows this past London Fashion Week season, Hair & Care is on a mission to make fashion week accessible.
Following this FW25 season at LFW, we spoke to Cofone to find out more about the organization and its process.
Tell us a bit about how Hair & Care came about, what was the catalyst?
I set up Hair & Care back in 2019 with the mission of supporting blind and low-vision women and girls with their hair care and styling. Having grown up with a blind parent, I’d seen first-hand the barriers blind people face, and also the impact that self-care can have on a person’s mental wellbeing, particularly someone living with sight loss. My father was always deeply passionate about clothes, styling, and how he presented himself, even as he gradually lost sight. This is really what inspired the inception of Hair & Care. In an industry that is largely inaccessible to blind and low-vision people, I wanted to create a space where women and girls in this community can feel seen, empowered and confident in themselves. Over the past 4 years, we have delivered free monthly hair and self-care workshops, since then supporting more than 300 blind and low-vision women and girls — and this is just the start!
What made Hair & Care want to be involved in Fashion Week, how did that relationship come about last season with Sinead O’Dwyer?
As a session hairstylist, my career has largely included working within fashion and across Fashion Week. Having started Hair & Care to make the hair industry more accessible to those with sight loss, I wanted to also bring this community into the world of fashion, to get to experience it inclusively. Much like the hair and beauty industry, fashion is also largely inaccessible to blind and low-vision people, but this is a community that wants to take part in it. There is a misconception that people with sight loss don’t care about clothes, beauty or the way they look, but the reality is quite the opposite.
Hair & Care first worked with Sinead in February 2024 at LFW, having approached her to make her show accessible to 3 blind and low-vision guests, who also got to have their hair done backstage. Fast forward to their next collaboration at Copenhagen Fashion Week in August 2024 and one of those previous guests, Lucy Edwards, became the first blind model to walk the runway in Copenhagen, having joined us again for our second accessible show. As a famously inclusive designer, Sinead was a perfect partnership for Hair & Care and its vision, and we’re so glad to have started our journey with her.
Tell me a bit about the decision to team up with the three designers this LFW season, what made you choose them?
I lead the hair for each of these designers at Fashion Week, so after successful partnerships with both Sinead and Chet Lo, it felt right to reach out to Roksanda, and Steven and Leo at SS Daley. We wanted to share our work with more designers to help them see the benefits of making their shows inclusive to the sight loss community, and we knew that these partnerships would bring their own individuality to the accessible experience. Each designer’s style brings a different level of artistry to the experience for blind and low-vision guests. The shapes, colours, silhouettes, textures – every detail that can be described in audio and felt in fabrics enhances the understanding and visualisation. Think Chet Lo’s signature spikes, SS Daley’s intricate detail and stitching and Roksanda’s gorgeous structures and fabrics.
How do you go about making those shows more accessible to differently-abled guests, where do you begin?
There are three parts to the process of making these shows accessible for blind and low-vision guests. We create detailed audio descriptions of each of the looks in the collection, describing the colours, shapes, and fabrics – that are listened to in real-time as the models walk the runway. We also provide fabric swatch booklets of the key fabrics used in the designs so that guests can feel these while listening to the audio. Guests can explore these fabrics ahead of the show while listening to an introduction audio from the designer, and descriptions of each of the fabrics. At the show, there are lots of things to consider to make the space accessible, including ensuring an accessible seating area that doesn’t overwhelm with noise, so that guests can listen to the descriptions — we work with the production teams to make sure we get this right at each show.
Ahead of each show, we have also hosted touch tours with each designer, where guests can feel some of the key pieces and learn more about the inspiration behind the collection. This allows guests to fully understand the process that the designer goes through when putting together a collection and is also a chance for the designer to learn more about the accessibility process and the experience a blind person goes through when it comes to considering clothes.
The touch tours sound like an amazing opportunity for guests. Can you tell us a bit more about them?
The purpose of the touch tours (as above) is really to enhance the guests’ understanding and visualisation of the collection – it’s an extension of being able to feel the fabric swatches, adding to the overall sensory experience by allowing guests to feel the shape of the pieces and how they might fall on the body when they are worn, and as they move. Sound can also play a part in this – an item might have beads or sequins that move when you move or a fabric that can be heard in a certain way when it is against other materials. Thinking about the fabric, the movement it allows, the sound or how the light might shine on it, are all elements that add to the overall visualisation guests have from the audio descriptions.
For SS Daley, guests explored the detail in the designs up close, including detailed stitching, hand-painted beads and a vast array of fabrics, and shared how these elements helped create an image of what they were feeling. I think it was really interesting for Steven and Leo to hear how their designs are visualised and experienced by somebody with sight loss – their collection is so beautiful and tactile, and having this mindset gives you a different perspective on how fashion is received by different people.
What else can you tell us about the specific ways that these three shows were made to be more accessible and inclusive this season?
This season we were lucky enough to have product support from both Sonos and Anker who supported individual shows, and we were able to provide noise-cancelling headphones for guests. This enhanced the audio experience and allowed us to ensure it was as seamless as possible without too much external noise — with music playing and busy venues, shows can be loud environments, and with audio being such a vital part of the accessibility process, it was super important for us.
How do you think that the industry can better support differently-abled guests, what still needs to be done?
There is no doubt still a long way to go in the fashion industry to be fully accessible for people with sight loss — everything from the physical and online shopping experience to product design and labelling. Within Fashion Week, our goal is to be able to continue advising brands on how to be more accessible for those with sight loss, and hope that more designers see both the power and value in having these elements implemented into their shows, and opening up their craft to this community.
