14 DAY TRIAL // 23-year-old Blair Griffith has been dreaming of competing in the Miss USA pageant ever since she was a little girl and, when she was crowned Miss Colorado, she thought her dream was about to come true. Then, she became homeless.
Her story has touched the heart of fashion designer Mac Duggal, who has agreed to design for her all the gowns she will need to be in pageant – free of charge, as The Huffington Post reports and the video below will confirm.
Griffith’s story took a very un-fairytale-like turn when her father died of cancer, and she and her mom were left with several unpaid medical bills.
To make matters even worse, shortly after, her mother also started having health issues, suffering a heart attack.
Her insurance company dropped her because of this, Blair explains, which meant the two were now literally overwhelmed by medical pills they couldn’t pay.
Blair also had student loans to cover, so that only made matters worse. She and her mom were eventually evicted from their house. The beauty queen lost her job soon afterwards.
Blair and her mother are living with friends and out of the kindness of strangers and, until not long ago, she’d lost all hopes of being able to run in the Miss USA pageant this year, because she clearly couldn’t afford the gowns.
Duggal heard of her case and decided to help her out. She’s supposed to meet with him soon to talk about the dressed she’s like to wear for the beauty pageant, and he’ll design them for her free of charge.
“I think she is beautiful. She’s gorgeous. She’s a survivor. She has gone through a lot. When I heard all of that, it wasn’t even a question. It was just an automatic thing to do, you know,” Duggal says.
It is believed the “donation” he makes to Blair by designing her gowns free of charge goes up to $60,000.