The talented teenagers from St Louis Grammar School have been chosen as the national winners of Vodafone's 'Cut It Out' Campaign, an anti-bullying competition which will see their dreamcoat design worn on the West End stage in the Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber production of Joseoph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

The young designers journeyed from Ballymena to London to see their coat worn on West End stage by Lee Mead during Anti-Bullying Week before meeting the star of the show at a private meet-and-greet ceremony.

The design by the four Year 10 pupils was already the regional winner for Northern Ireland but was crowned the national winner after receiving over 15,000 votes on the popular teenage website, www.mybliss.co.uk.

The coat received 3,000 more votes than the other six winning designs from across the UK.

The anti-bullying-inspired coat highlighted the different types of bullying that take place in society including computers and mobile phones to represent cyber-bullying, footprints to illustrate people from different walks of life, black and white swirls to highlight racism and fat and thin swirls to convey bullying that occurs because of a person's weight or appearance. The complex design was interpreted and brought to life by an aspiring designer from the London College of Fashion.

Their colourful masterpiece, along with the six regional winners, will be auctioned off for the UK's leading bullying prevention charity, Beatbullying. The eBay auction will run until 9am on Monday, November 27.

To bid for a piece of musical history, log onto www.ebay.co.uk/beatbullying
This year's CUT-it-Out campaign, a joint initiative between Vodafone and Beatbullying, was launched in September and challenged school children to re-design the famous Technicolor Dreamcoat based on the theme of bullying.

Children were asked to consider using different colours, textures and fabrics and provide a short statement with their entry to explain the inspiration behind their design.

Nicki Woodhead, Head of Corporate Responsibility at Vodafone UK, commented: "We'd like to congratulate St Louis Grammar School on being the overall winner of the CUT-it-Out campaign. Their stunning and well-thought-out dreamcoat design really brought home the anti-bullying message. We would also like to thank everyone else who took part in the campaign for their support and hard work."

Actor Lee Mead who will wear the St Louis coat of many colours commented: "Stopping bullying is something I'm very passionate about.
"Having experienced verbal and physical bullying in the past myself, I wanted to help raise the profile and encourage people to speak out against bullies. Bullying is a huge issue, so it's great that Beatbullying and Vodafone have decided to take action against it and create the CUT-it-Out campaign."

Each week at least 450,000 young people are bullied in school and a further 500,000 are bullied outside of school. Anti-Bullying Week, held from November 17-21 this year, is an annual UK event which focuses on the problem of bullying and how to prevent it.