LONDON - Milla Magee was crowned Miss England in May with some reports calling her the first plus size Miss England. The 23-year-old said whatever your size “it doesn’t matter” and she wants to use her reign to spread the message. She lives in Newquay in Cornwall, but grew up in London where she was surrounded by rock ‘n’ roll, with a mum who worked at Creation Records, the label of Oasis and Primal Scream.
Her godmother is Noel Gallagher’s ex-wife Meg Matthews, and Milla was “trying to conform to the lifestyle”. “I went to an all-girls school and I think that’s where the struggle started,” she said. “A lot of the other girls were petite and small.
“It’s not in my bone structure to look like that but I tried to conform to that because it’s what society told me I had to look like.” What followed was body dysmorphia, a condition which causes people to believe they are extremely ugly. She said: “And then I just it dawned on me, I thought, ‘no, I will make it my style’.
” Looking back to curvy beauties of the past such as Marilyn Monroe was her inspiration. “We had role models of women back in the day, like the gorgeous Marilyn Monroe, who was curvaceous, or models like Naomi Campbell, who are very tall and athletically built,” she said. “And they’re so beautiful, and embrace their looks.
“It’s about embracing whatever we’ve been born with and it’s still beautiful.” Now, winning the Miss England title as the only size 16 in the line-up, she wants to be “that representative that I wish I had”. What also helped her shun the demands of the body perfect was surfing on trips down from London and in Newquay where she has lived since she was 16.
“Surfing saved my life because at that time living in London I struggled a lot mentally and that was trying to conform to the lifestyle that I was born into,” she said. “It was a very different lifestyle to the way I live now. “I was trying to conform to my surroundings because we’ve got this image of what men and women should look like.
“But if you’re passionate and stay true to yourself, if you’re kind and humble that’s all that matters.”.
