“People have to be aware themselves of their body and how it works” – The Salford group raising awareness for breast cancer

A group in Salford have created a project which shows a woman’s journey with breast cancer.

The ‘Think Pink’ project aims to spread awareness about the disease and they have designed a dress made of bras, with each element representing something different.

Their vision is to create a performance about a woman’s journey with breast cancer.

A member of the project, Janine McDonald, is part of The Bravoo Tribe Charity, which collects bras to support small businesses in Africa. Some of the bras collected were used to make the dress.

Think Pink are hoping to make their project widespread.

Imma Totaro, a wellbeing coach originally from Italy, said: “I was thinking about going to speak with Salford Council to see if we can do something. It’s an idea, still an idea. “It was kind of a private project at first. But because other groups went public, we thought ‘why not?’.

“We are thinking as well to do some calendars to try selling and giving more chance to try and help the charity for Breast Cancer UK. We were thinking every month is a different picture of how we created the project. Every slide in our PowerPoint can be one month. So, explaining what we were doing in that moment.”

Imma has a certain vision for the performance. She said:

“My view is I see a stage where someone is working with the bra dress. And we were thinking a small balloon with dark glitter inside goes on her and goes all in the side.

“It’s figuratively a cancer that is touching her and in that moment she will look sad,” she added

“But after she will open her wings behind, and she will be proudly walking again. It’s the idea that a woman is proudly walking. She will continue to be proud.”

“Our message is more about: people have to be aware themselves of their body and how it works and how they can check the differences” she added

“So, for us, it’s very important to give this awareness to people, so they check themselves every time if they feel something different.”

The project came about as part of a community group called Mum in Business International. It has groups from all over the country. Leona Burton, the director, told every city part of it to present a project about breast cancer.

Imma said: “Women go into depression because of it. My two cousins in Italy had a mastectomy so they were both operated on. I know the frustration of women after that.

“Because it’s our point to be proud.

“Women are proud in two points – their bodies and their hair. We want to help the women who suffer this problem to be proud of themselves in some way.”

The group have recently created a fundraiser where people can donate which will go towards Breast Cancer Research. The fundraiser can be found here.

The link the PowerPoint can be found here.