Zebedee talent boss backs Support Dogs charity making a difference to disabled people

Support Dogs provides and trains assistance dogs to help children with autism, and adults with epilepsy or a physical disability, to live safer, more independent lives.

The move is another step for Laura in helping people with disabilities.

With sister-in-law Zoe Proctor, an ex-performing arts teacher who worked with people with disabilities, she set up Zebedee as an agency for disabled, visibly different, non-binary and transgender models.

It is committed to changing the way disability and gender identity are represented in fashion and the wider media.

For former social worker Laura, the agency is a way in which she can combine her values of fighting for social justice and advocating for underrepresented groups with the beauty and art of fashion and wider media.

As for joining Support Dogs, Laura, who lives in Sheffield and has an 18-year-old Patterdale Terrier called Marley, says: “I love people and I love dogs and I just hope I’ve got something to give,” she says.

“I just love what Support Dogs does. Obviously, disability is close to my heart. The charity is making such an impact on disabled people’s lives – the same as what we are doing, but in such a different area.

"Many of our talent do have assistance dogs, so I see in practice the impact it has.”

Laura, 41, was approached by Tess Thompson, Support Dogs’ community fundraising manager, to see how Zebedee might be able to help the charity.

She ran this year’s Great North Run in honour of the charity, raising £3,000, and it is hoped that Support Dogs clients may go on to feature in some of Zebedee’s modelling or acting campaigns.

Support Dogs was recently granted planning permission for a new headquarters, near Hillsborough Stadium.

The move will enable the charity to increase the number of dogs it trains and therefore the number of people it can help.

Laura, who is mum to Edith, eight, and Bernie, six, says: “I would love the new centre to be as fantastic as the vision is looking.

"I can’t wait to see the charity grow, because I know it’s in a position to grow so much in these next few years, to have the provision to deliver more dogs, and the impact is so huge on the individuals the charity is supporting.

“It just blows my mind, the support these dogs can give and the independence people can have. They are completely life-changing.

"We work with children, and I don’t think parents can even contemplate the impact a support dog can have on their child, until they get one.

"To get to a point where each child who needs a support dog could have that provision, would be amazing.”