FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Celebrities Put Their Best Faces Forward to Benefit Puget Sound Blood Center

FEBRUARY 27, 2001, SEATTLE — Puget Sound Blood Center is putting on a new "face" during the month of March to raise funds for medical research.

Faces for Life is an on-line auction of more than 200 ceramic masks decorated by local and national business leaders, celebrities and artists. The masks will be displayed March 3 - 31 at Bellevue Square, where visitors can see the masks in person, take part in weekend family activities and bid using the on-line bidding station in the Square's Center Court.

Local and national figures who created or commissioned masks include Muhammad Ali, tennis star Andre Agassi, singer Garth Brooks, Survivor host Jeff Probst and actors Sylvester Stallone and William Shatner, artists Dale Chihuly and Alden Mason, Seattle Mayor Paul Schell, Boeing Chairman Phil Condit, author Tom Robbins and actor Tom Skerritt. Children at Ronald MacDonald House and a 12-year-old burn patient at Harborview Medical Center created masks as well.

Fifty masks will be auctioned live at a gala dinner on Saturday, March 24, in the Spanish Ballroom at Seattle's Four Seasons Olympic Hotel.

All proceeds will benefit Blood Center research projects, including the umbilical cord blood bank to help people with leukemia and other potentially fatal blood diseases; and the pancreatic islet program, which is seeking a cure for type I diabetes.

The exhibit also is a celebration of the thousands of people who donate marrow, blood, platelets and tissue to help patients in need. They truly are the faces of life.

Preview the masks at www.facesforlife.org. Bidding online will begin Saturday, March 3.

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