STUDENTS who stripped off for a saucy calendar to fund their course were left stunned when university chiefs insisted they just can’t bare it.

Southampton fashion students bared all for the photoshoot, ditching their clothes for strategically placed props.

Fourteen women posed together in the main picture with only wool, knitting needles and strips of material to cover their modesty.

They then posed in small groups, using each season as a theme for the giant poster which features a harvest and a beach scene.

But the fundraising venture got shelved by professors on campus who removed the posters “in the interests of sensitivity”.

Now the cash-strapped fashionistas, whose sales soared to £350 in just three days, are devastated.

The budding designers planned to raise vital funds for their final year fashion show, where the students get to showcase their hard work in front of potential headhunters in London and again at Southampton Solent University.

Student Vicky Hicks said the students need to raise about £4,000 to fund models and brochures and if they did not meet the target, cuts would be made to their shows.

The 22-year-old said: “I really don’t understand why it was banned in the university. A lot of friends at different colleges and universities have done the same and a lot of students in Southampton came up to us and said they would buy one this term because now their student loans are through.

“For fashion students, these final shows could be the launch of our careers. It’s really important we’re able to display our work well.”

The saucy students took inspiration from the famous WI ‘Calendar Girls’ after seeing the hit stage show at Southampton’s Mayflower Theatre.

The women, who are aged between 21 and 25, produced 500 calendars costing a total of £400.

The university initially agreed they could sell calendars from a stand in the main building for three days, when profits soared and they sold 200.

But they then got an email from academic staff saying they could not sell any in the campus after complaints from staff.

A spokesman for Southampton Solent University said: “Following a couple of complaints the university decided, in the interests of sensitivity, to remove the promotional posters from public view.

“However, the students are still able to sell their fundraising posters off campus.”