Luster, who resides in Chicago, established her company, Xposzure, and put together her very first fashion show earlier this year with the help of the management team she developed. With no sponsors or money for her show, she earned funds the old fashioned way.
“The way my team and I raised money for this event was by having a car wash and conducting bake sales,” said Luster. “I know it sounds corny, but it actually worked!”
According to Luster, “the whole purpose of Xposzure is to give up-and-coming fashion designers, performers, models and stylists exposure to the public.”
With Luster Products Inc., being established in 1957, Theresa, 20, has grown up around the beauty industry for her entire life. She really got inspired to dig into the fashion world when she saw the very pink and fashion forward movie, Legally Blonde, which stars Reese Witherspoon as the savvy and outgoing Elle Woods. This then led Theresa to try out modeling, but she didn’t get a successful start with that.
“I was an aspiring model for the longest, but due to my lack of height, I was not very successful at my attempt,” Luster said.
Still having a strong interest in fashion, Theresa didn’t give up completely on her passion. That’s
where Xpozsure came into play. In forming this company, Luster can still be a part of the fashion world by being behind the scenes.
She now puts together fashion shows to help up-and-coming models and designers get exposure. Luster held open model auditions for her fashion show and she also brought in a friend to help her models learn how to walk.
“When I realized that none of the models knew how to walk as actual models, I reached out to a friend of mine,” said Luster. “His name is KC and he works for BMG modeling agency. He and I conducted a series of workshops, which taught the models how to walk and pose for both print and runway.”
Luster uses local Chicago designers, aspiring student fashion designers and up-and-coming boutique’s clothing in the Chicago land area for her shows.
“I choose the designers based upon the clientele and marketing my fashion shows appeal to,” Luster said.
Her first fashion show took about five months to put together, and she had to put in a lot of hard work. With no sponsors or money to begin with, she had to build up her name to get the final product she achieved with her management team.
Luster said, “Many people assume that to put on a fashion show without a school or an organization behind them would be extremely eas, and even more assume that because my last name is Luster, that it would have made things super easy, but news flash—it was not!”
“When it’s your first time taking on a project such as mine, companies and individuals are not willing to invest in you or your company. Unless, the age group that my event would attract would appeal to the same age group and crowd the company is looking to acquire customers for,” she said.
Even with putting this show together alone with no sponsorship money, Luster still joined with a non-for-profit organization called The Sky Cares Foundation that was looking to make their cause aware to the public.
“The Sky Cares Foundation’s mission is to build girls’ self-esteem, provide girls and young women with positive mentors, and promote a healthy lifestyle and positive self-image through education and support for youth and family development initiatives,” she said.
Luster continues to build upon her company Xposzure for the future, and she is also taking a stab at designing clothes.
“Designing clothes is something I am looking into and I have quite a few sketches, but I am in process of taking sewing classes,” Luster said.
