Spotlight on Shavaun Crawford!

The yound talented Shavaun Crawford was on the spotlight again when a travel agent from Vanada  sought him out to present him witha special gift: a sewing machine, and Anguilla Magazine was there to witness it. In our March issue we published an interview with Shavaun who shared with us his dream of becoming a Fashion designer. He is already expressing his talent through the fabulous  figurines sold at Sea Breeze ( old Bartletts). Judi Schulz, a travel agent who has never met Shavaun before heard about him while she was in Anguilla and kindly thought about bringing him a sewing machine on her next trip.

Here is Her Story: “I visited the island earlier this year with my family. I was there for three weeks (Feb 14 – Mar 6th) arriving with my husband and son because my son had his one week university break  Feb 14 – 21 and my daughters break was to be the first week of March. Somehow my daughter ended up coming earlier and staying to the end (J) and she brought a friend who stayed for 10 days. After her friend left a my sister arrived with her son and her daughter came for the last few days – so I had a revolving door of people at the Poinsettia Villa where we were staying.

 

Because of the length of my stay I made it a holiday combined with an independent fam trip. I went around to a lot of properties to do inspections and tried to get to know the locals and the hangouts, restaurants, shops, beaches, groceries, etc.

 

One place I went to  a few times was Pamela Miller’s shop next to the smoothie stop  (we stopped for smoothies and I went shopping!). The first time in the store I saw Shavaun’s shadow box pictures which I loved. I got chatting with Pam about them and she told me about Shavaun – his love of fashion and wanting to perhaps be a designer one day. I believe she said his favourite designer is Dolce and Gabbana (is this correct?). She went on to say that the hope was that a sewing machine could be found for him, so he could create some things of his own.

I then said I had two sewing machines sitting at home – one of which is mine and which I was not likely to use again, so I said I would like to donate it to Shavaun.

I knew Dale Pusching, Canada’s Anguilla Tourism rep, would be down again and I also knew I would be trying to join one of the agent fam’s – so I told Pam I would get it down one way or another.

 

My daughter Emily loves fashion too and is in fashion merchandising at Sheridan College here in Oakville. I thought it would be wonderful for her to meet Shavaun and see his work and be inspired by him. Unfortunately each time we passed by the store it was not open. The last week I was there we managed to get there when it was open, but Shavaun did not stop by that day and all his pictures were sold! So we came home empty handed so to speak. I do feel that this story will be important for Emily though – she will see how much she has and how lucky she is, but how sometimes the less you have the further you go (the hungrier you are). She is still searching for what it is she wants to or should be doing. I just always like to present inspiration and possibilities to my children and hopefully something will trigger a response. I was never terribly driven myself and only late in life have I found my passion.”

 

Judi said that she had a fabulous experience in Anguilla and was mostly touched by all the hospitable people she had met. Thank you Judi for your kindness, and thank you for supporting Shavaun’s dream.