About Me

My name is Alicia Searcy, and I am the Spashionista.

I live in Nashville, Tennessee, and was born with Cerebral Palsy. I’m wheelchair or walker dependent because CP affects my balance and ability to perform tasks that require fine motor skills such as typing and fastening small buttons. Growing up my mother, who was a model in her youth, was very critical of my body shape and weight. Because of this I struggled between bouts of anorexia and weight gain for most of my life. For many years I simply gave up on myself and my appearance. As a result and because of my disability many people treated me as if I couldn’t think for myself. They would speak to the people around me but not directly to me. My desire to change the way people perceived me led me to pay attention to how I was presenting myself in public. I basically gave myself a makeover and it made a world of difference in my interactions with others. It gave me the confidence to self-advocate and a passion for using fashion as a means of self-expression.

In 2012, I googled “disabled fashion blogger” and there weren’t any listed. So I started Spashionista (short for spastic fashionista), one of the first fashion blogs by a person with a disability on the internet, to address the need for disabled representation within the fashion industry.

I’m also the co-founder and Executive Director of the nonprofit organization Fashion is for Every Body. Our mission is to challenge stereotypes and change lives using the transformative power of fashion. We use fashion as a language to promote body-postivity and self-esteem while seeking inclusion for adults of all ages, sizes and physical abilities within the fashion industry.