Red Carpet Walk: Connect with your Feminine Power and Confident Self, Friday, Jan. 24, 7-9 p.m. at the Silk Purse Arts Centre. Tickets: $45/one or $75/two (15 per cent discount offered if purchased by Monday, Jan. 20).
Registration required. redcarpetwalk.com
West Vancouver's Taaja Kayler knows a thing or two about strutting her stuff.
The veteran model has more than 25 years of professional runway experience under her belt and in an effort to impart some of what she's learned, since 2008 Kayler has been offering Red Carpet Walk workshops for women of all ages and stages. Less about the fashion industry, Kayler uses the catwalk as a metaphor to teach participants what she describes as "the walk, the look and how to own the room" as a means of empowering them in their everyday lives - both personal and professional.
"The Red Carpet Walk is connecting with your feminine power and your confident self," she says. Participants are encouraged to let their "beautiful spirit shine," and "that's what we do, we bring it out on the runway," she adds.
Kayler's next workshop is scheduled for Friday, Jan. 24 at 7 p.m. and the red carpet will be unfurled at West Vancouver's Silk Purse Arts Centre. "People have a lot of fun. It's also community-oriented because people are meeting each other in many cases for the first time, and they're having fun right away," she says.
Women are taught the classic model walk, or the yoga walk. "This involves using your hips, this is really the whole part of learning this walk, which gives you your beautiful sexy self," she says.
Other workshop topics include tapping into participants' "powerful presence," increasing selfconfidence and self-esteem, getting over their fears of making eye contact, improving their body language and tips on how to feel noticed, valued and accepted. "It's a time to re-discover yourself," says Kayler.
Many women find her Red Carpet Walk workshops to be transformational.
"They're completely different when they finish than when they started," she says.
Watching their transformation proves to be a joyful experience.
"I love to watch people blossom. It's about flowering, to watch them in the state where they start out and they're just not sure of what's going to happen in this workshop," she says. "They're excited on one hand and a little bit scared on the other because it's quite different, it's quite challenging for people in many ways. When I watch them by the time they're finished, they're smiling, they feel good about themselves.. .. "For me it's about being able to offer something that I've worked through my whole life and now at that turning point, I can turn around and give that back to them," she says.
Kayler's Red Carpet Walk workshops are offered once a month at the Silk Purse Arts Centre. In addition, she offers private sessions.
