Jeans for Genes Day 2019

Back in July I was invited to the launch of this year’s Jeans for Genes campaign and joined The Saturday’s Vanessa White and Nikki Lilly to introduce this year’s campaign t-shirt. If you don’t know of Nikki Lilly, I suggest you go and find out. Diagnosed with AVM as a young child, Nikki has gone on to be an inspirational figure spreading confidence and kindness wherever she goes, and with 990K+ subscribers to her YouTube channel and 150k followers on Instagram, it turns out she’s spreading that stuff worldwide. Oh and did I mention she was only 15?

Vanessa White & Nikki Lilly

For those who don’t know, Jeans for Genes Day raises money for Genetic Disorders UK - an organisation researching genetic disorders and working hard to provide support to those diagnosed and to reduce the number of babies and small children diagnosed each year - which is a whopping 30,000. That’s 1 in 25 children affected by one of 6,000 genetic disorders. This year, the campaign is running from Monday 16th September to Friday 20nd September and schools and workplaces all over the country take part by donating and wearing jeans for the day.

Every year, the campaign launches a t-shirt design which is currently on sale to help raise funds and this year, Jeans for Genes have collaborated with Warner Brothers UK., and Kingston University. The Batman inspired design was created by Chayanis Jumrus depicting the strength and bravery of those affected. The hair motif also included represents the idea of DNA which is, of course, central to the battle against genetic disorders.

There are many ways to support Jeans for Genes day - encourage your children’s school to get involved, or your workplace. Buy the t-shirt or simply spread the word. Whatever you can do to support this campaign next week will be hugely appreciated by the three people that run the entire Jeans for Genes campaign - did I mention that? Go on - do what you can.