Last Tuesday, Jeffrey Fashion Cares, the annual fashion fundraiser benefiting the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community and those living with HIV/AIDS celebrated its 10 year anniversary with a kick-off cocktail event at the Jeffrey store. Jeffrey Kalinsky, president and CEO of Jeffrey New York/Atlanta, along with Town and Country and the magazine's editor-in-chief Jay Fielden, welcomed a bevy of fashion insiders and Jeffrey Fashion Cares supporters (including event co-chairs Christian Langbein, William Li and David Wu) to do some after-hours shopping and toast the charity's fundraising milestone.
As has been tradition for the past several years, the Fashion Cares Fundraiser will take place on April 2nd on the Intrepid. It has come a long way from its inaugural year, which Kalinsky staged at the store itself. "In a way, that was my favorite year," he told me. "Everyone who worked at the store worked at the event. We had no money and everyone pulled together to make it happen."
A decade and millions of dollars raised later, Kalinsky is not one to rest on his laurels: "I think that milestones are great to celebrate, but the most important thing about the event is that we keep our mission to raise the most money to put in the charities' hands. We deliver no less than 85 cents of every dollar and sometimes 90 -- averaging at 88 percent."
Among the beneficiaries for this year's April 2nd benefit/fashion show will be: The Hetrick Martin (HMI), Lambda Legal, ACRIA and the Point Foundation. Advanced tickets may be bought online at www.jeffreyfashioncares.org.