LONDON — Australian designers Camilla Freeman-Topper and Marc Freeman, who are behind the label Camilla and Marc, are continuing their fight for ovarian cancer.
The brand announced their fifth “Ovaries. Talk About Them.” campaign on Tuesday with Italian model Bianca Balti with the news that they are on track to bring the “world’s first circulating tumor DNA-based early detection test for ovarian cancer to clinical trials by 2026.”
In the campaign she’s wearing a T-shirt that’s printed with “It all begins with ovaries.”
Camilla and Marc launched the campaign in 2019 and has since raised more than $2.5 million in direct research funding.
Bianca Balti for Camilla and Marc.
Courtesy
The research has been led by Professor Caroline Ford and her all-female team at the University of New South Wales’ Gynaecological Cancer Research Group in Sydney.
“We’re on the verge of a scientific breakthrough that could fundamentally change outcomes for people with ovarian cancer around the world. Early detection is the missing piece — and we’re closer than ever to delivering it,” said Ford.
Camilla and Marc collaborated with Naomi Watts, Dree Hemingway, Georgia Fowler and Willa Devereux last year for their campaign.
Ovarian cancer is a special cause for the sibling designers.
“My brother Marc and I lost our mum to ovarian cancer when we were just 11 and 13. That was over 30 years ago and since then the statistics for this disease have barely changed. There was no test then and there is no test now and that is purely down to a lack of funding and a systemic bias in the health care system against women,” creative director Freeman-Topper told WWD last year.