Red Dress Day

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Red Dress Day honours the lives of all the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives (MMIR), and raises awareness of this critical issue.

Every year on May 5, red dresses are displayed in windows as a reminder of all the pain experienced by loved ones, survivors, and those lost.

The Inspiration

This movement is inspired by the grassroots movement of Métis artist Jaime Black, who created the REDress Project, "an aesthetic response to the more than 1,000 missing and murdered Aboriginal women in Canada".

Through the installation, Black hoped to draw attention to the "gendered and racialized nature of violent crimes against Aboriginal women and to evoke a presence through the marking of absence".

Show your support by:

Wearing red on May 5 to show solidarity
Displaying a red dress in your window, workplace or another public space

Background

The first Red Dress event was held on May 5, 2010, as a day of honouring for missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, two spirited and men, and as a day to raise awareness and education on the critical national issue. Red dresses are hung in trees or affixed to a structure, as if floating, and left empty to evoke the missing women and girls - Black was told by a friend that red is the only colour spirits could see.

(Red)is really a calling back of the spirits of these women and allowing them a chance to be among us and have their voices heard through their family members and community.

- Jaime Black

girl running y red dresses

Photo Credit: Mufty Mathewson

Contact Us

Indigenous Relations Office

Community Services
18th Floor, Edmonton Tower
10111 104 Avenue NW
P.O. Box 2359
Edmonton, AB T5J 2R7

Email	indigenousrelations@edmonton.ca
Phone	780-944-7602
Fax	780-577-3525