Campaigner goes bust after calendar boob

10:30pm Tuesday 9th October 2007

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A woman has been forced to declare herself bankrupt after her charity calendar featuring semi-naked spinners and weavers left her with massive debts.

Joan Kendall, 53, of Barcombe Place, Barcombe, wanted to follow in the footsteps of the Rylstone WI Calendar Girls who were first to fundraise for charity by posing in the nude.

The story was immortalised in 2003 by the film starring Dame Helen Mirren and Julie Walters, inspiring hundreds of other women including Ms Kendall and her fellow weavers and spinners from Sussex to create a calendar.

But with stiff opposition from scores of similar offerings and a problem with a few visible nipples, Ms Kendall found herself unable to sell 9,000 of the 10,000 calendars she had ordered.

The cheese shop assistant has tried to rebuild her life after her attempts to raise money for the Rare Breeds Survival Trust, which works to protect rare farm animals, left her penniless.

But facing a £15,000 debt mountain, she is believed to have become the first victim of the fundraising craze and has had to declare herself bankrupt at Brighton County Court.

She said: "It was the first thing like that I had done.

"When we did the shoot we did not intend to show our boobs and we had no idea what we were doing and it did put people off.

"I would have done it differently but it was the best time I ever had and it was a fantastic experience I do not regret doing at all.

"It was just unfortunate that there was another 200 charity calendars that we were in competition with.

"I was left to pick up the pieces of a £15,000 debt.

"We didn't raise anything and because it was my creation I had to bear the brunt."

Spinner Ms Kendall managed to persuade ten colleagues aged between 40 and 80 - and the two-year-old daughter of one of them - to pose against a backdrop of some of the county's most beautiful scenery.

The Spin and Bare It project involved photo shoots on Rottingdean beach, Plashett Wood, near Uckfield, Atlantic Alpacas in Glyndebourne, Bluebell Wood, near Arlington Reservoir, and the Harvey's brewery in Lewes.

But the women had left a few exposed nipples and breasts in the calendar, causing outrage among some groups and making Ms Kendall's job of selling the product all the more difficult.

After 15 months of sales from the websites and in farms and shops around Sussex, fewer than 1,000 of the 10,000 printed had been sold.

She decided to pulp the remaining calendars and after trying to battle with the debt, eventually decided that she would not be able to find the money and declared herself bankrupt.

She said: "Bankruptcy was quite a blow but it hasn't ruined my life.

"For a while I didn't want to go down that route but in the end I decided I had to.

"I have got over it, although I understand that for some people it would be the end of the world, I am quite resilient.

"If you haven't got anything to lose than you can't lose it - I had nothing to lose.

"And I have come out the other end"

And despite the financial difficulties the calendar caused, Ms Kendall would do it again - but with less flesh on display.

She said: "I would do it all again as long as I am do not have to finance it.

"My only advice would be: do not show boobs."