“We have the power to challenge and redefine beauty every day through our words and actions.”
Ben Barry is the founder of the Ben Barry Agency in Canada, the first modeling agency in the world to represent models of all ages, sizes, backgrounds, and abilities. He is also author of Fashioning Reality: A New Generation of Entrepreneurship, and a popular speaker on body image and entrepreneurship. His profile has been featured on MTV, Fashion Television, and The Oprah Winfrey Show. Barry is currently working on a Ph.D. at Judge Business School at Cambridge University that examines perceptions of beauty around the world. He is chair of the board of directors of the Toronto Fashion Incubator and a member of the board of the Canadian Foundation for Women’s Health. He has been honored with the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal and is the first male recipient of the Governor General’s Awards in Commemoration of the Persons Case. (www.Benbarry.com)
You can read Ben’s Epiphany by clicking here.
The Interview
I was referred to Ben by his uncle when he learned of my project. He gave me a brief overview of Ben’s prodigious background, and I definitely was interested in talking to him. At the ripe old age of twenty-seven, he is incredibly accomplished and is definitely someone to watch. For one reason or another, it took more than a year for us to schedule an interview. I ran into his uncle at an event a few months before the book was completed and exclaimed that I needed to try to get in touch with Ben again, and he said, “Well, that should be easy—he’s staying with us for the next two weeks.” And just like that, I got to have my interview in person with the very affable and driven Ben Barry on a balmy California afternoon at his aunt and uncle’s fabulous pad in Marina del Rey.
Ben Barry Models, Kate and Alison
