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Stepping out into the bright lights on a fashion runway, a group of first-time Aboriginal models from the red centre are showing off their designs and newly-found self-confidence.
It is the first time many of the 35 young people involved in Yapa Styles Fashion Festival have ever set foot on a stage, and with up to 300 audience members filling the Araluen Arts Centre, nerves are building.
The annual event in Alice Springs aims to boost self-esteem, reduce substance abuse in the community and change the negative stereotype of youth in the town.
Eight-year-old Cheyenne Shaw said she was nervous backstage but felt "great" when she was on stage in front of everyone.
"I like modelling and dressing up in clothes, because all the dresses are really good," she said.
"It's really fun."
The program began four years ago, when founder Hannah Nungarrayi became increasingly concerned and saddened by the number of young people and children out on the street late at night in Alice Springs.
"I'm a mum so it hurts me, my heart would break if I saw my kids walking the streets," she said.
"I wanted something that the kids could feel they could come to, feel safe and learn life skills.
"There are some young ones that just put up a hard fight — to hear their stories, to hear their resilience, it's empowering."
With a background in design, organising a fashion festival for Aboriginal youth made perfect sense for Ms Nungarrayi.
Over the past 19 weeks, participants have undertaken deportment and etiquette training, counselling, drug and alcohol education and learned public speaking and performance.
A big focus of Yapa Styles Fashion Festival is also the garments, many of which have been made by the young models themselves to reflect their culture and identity.
But Ms Nungarrayi said Yapa Styles — which means Aboriginal in Warlpiri language and sister in East Arnhem Land — was not really about modelling, but giving participants the skills and confidence to put their best foot forward in life.
"My focus is on the inner person, I think that's what makes the individual," she said.
"It's all about building their confidence, role models and leaders within their own circle of peers.
"What they learn here, all the good qualities and values, they take back home."
Kate Brown gave Yapa Styles a go for the first time this year and said "it was a world of fun".
"[I've loved] meeting new friends and making a solid community here, it's really nice to have people I can talk to," she said.
"I've become more confident in dancing in front of people … because I've had a real issue with it, like getting on stage and performing."
Topics: fashion, design, aboriginal, indigenous-aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander, alice-springs-0870