Updated 4:10 p.m. Jan. 21 with details on "The Power of Red: Cocktails & Couture," to be held Feb. 28.

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By Dateline staff

The beat goes on for heart health at UC Davis, especially in February — National Heart Month — when, for the second year in a row, we will wear red T-shirts and gather on an IM field to form a giant heart.

About 2,500 people — students, staff, faculty and community members — turned out for last year’s inaugural heart formation, an impressive showing despite the day’s rainfall. The organizers are hoping to see even more people this year, on Friday, Feb. 6.

At an evening event later in the month, we will celebrate this year’s additions to the UC Davis Red Dress Collection — dresses made by design students as their take on the national symbol for heart health awareness among women, who, for the most part, do not know that heart disease is their leading cause of death.

Typically, women think of heart disease as a man’s disease, according to Amparo Villablanca, director of the UC Davis Women’s Cardiovascular Medicine Program. “Yet all women are at risk, no woman is immune and deaths are increasing for younger women,” she said.

The Women’s Cardiovascular Medicine Program joined with Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi to present the first UC Davis Wears Red Day, including the heart formation and the Battle Heart Disease Fair, and they’re doing the same this year.

Coinciding with National Wear Red Day, Feb. 6, the UC Davis celebration includes a new heart design on T-shirts set to go on sale Monday (Jan. 26) at all UC Davis Stores (Memorial Union, Pro Shop, Welcome Center and Downtown).

Prices range from $7 to $12, depending on style and size, and $2 from every sale will go to the Women’s Cardiovascular Medicine Program.

The Alpha Pi Sigma, a sorority that addresses heart health as a special cause, is once organizing the Battle Heart Disease Fair. It will be in tents around the heart formation zone on Hutchison Field. The fair runs from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., and fairgoers will be asked to join the heart formation during the noon hour.

And don’t worry about the weather: Last year’s crowd didn’t seem to mind getting a little wet. “We had so much fun,” student Danelle Eslinger said last year. “Just being out here with friends, being with so many people who care about this cause.”

Red dresses

The Red Dress Collection’s 2015 additions will be debuted the night of Saturday, Feb. 28, at “The Power of Red: Cocktails & Couture,” hosted by Chancellor Katehi. The benefit event is scheduled from 7 to 9 p.m. in the Grand Nave Ballroom of the Sheraton Grand hotel, 1230 J St., Sacramento.

Tickets are $250 per person, with proceeds going to the Women’s Cardiovascular Medicine Program and the Department of Design. Sponsorship opportunities are also available. For more information, contact Jean Wigglesworth at Ceremonies and Special Events, (530) 754-2011.

The Department of Design and the Women’s Cardiovascular Medicine Program launched the UC Davis Red Dress project in 2000 with the goal of engaging women across generations in heart health awareness. Students have been adding to the collection every year since.

You can see 18 of the dresses in a winter quarter exhibition, “Red Dress, Design Stories for Heart Health,” at the Design Museum (in Cruess Hall). The museum is open from noon to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday, and runs through March 13.

More about the UC Davis Red Dress Collection, including albums of each year's dresses.

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