Sunday mornings usually find me reading the papers in bed, eating pancakes with my children or taking the dog for a walk.
Today, however, I am standing in a hotel ladies’ toilet with my ten-year-old daughter, trying to prise her feet into a pair of ridiculously strappy high-heeled shoes.
‘Ow, Mummy, that HURTS,’ Annie protests loudly, attracting a smug glance from another mother who is viciously sticking curling pins into the hair — and occasionally the head — of her silent, uncomplaining daughter.
Outside, in a vast conference room, chaos is brewing. Girls as young as three are being coaxed into strappy dresses and adorned with body glitter, as their mothers — all tight white jeans, manicured nails and enough bling to accessorise the whole of Essex — fight for wall sockets to plug in hair straighteners.
Welcome to the UK Cinderella Beauty Pageant at the decidedly unglamorous Ramada Hotel in Ealing, West London, a stone’s throw from the North Circular.
This is the latest event in a disturbing trend that is fast gaining ground in the UK and could soon be taking place in a three-star hotel near you.
Unsurprisingly, this pageant originated in America 36 years ago. It was launched here two years ago by former model Diana Hare.
Today, there are 24 contestants, ranging in age from three to 16. Their sights are set firmly on Las Vegas, since that is where one winner and her posse of family hangers-on will be heading to compete in a ‘sister’ pageant.
Inspiration: The formal wear round brings out gowns akin to those favoured by Katie Price
Dressed to impress: Shona Sibary and her ten-year-old daughter Annie in her pageant outfit
Annie is a tomboy at heart and thinks the whole thing is pretty stupid
Frightening: One mother in California gives her eight-year-old daughter Botox all in the name of beauty pageant success
Second and third place runners-up receive a flimsy Made In Taiwan tiara and a trophy so tacky I doubt that even the pushiest of mothers would dare to display it on their mantelpiece.
The rest, who have all forked out a £195 registration fee to be here today, will receive nothing. Except, perhaps, a salutary lesson in how not to spend a Sunday.
Child beauty pageants are big business in America, with little girls — some only just out of nappies — dressing in disturbingly mature outfits to be paraded in front of judges. The over-sexualisation of these young girls has caused huge controversy worldwide.
So, you might rightfully ask, why have I brought my own daughter along to compete in one of these events? We are here undercover to find out what goes on behind the scenes of a children’s beauty pageant and to try to understand why a growing number of British mothers see them as little more than harmless fun.
Our investigation actually began last October when Annie attended a previous heat and — to my horror and her bemusement — came second, automatically qualifying her for this final round.
(I later discovered, however, that any parent can fork out the cash to enter their child into the final, which makes a total mockery of the previous competition.)
Annie understands she isn’t being entered seriously; that it’s just for my work. Luckily, she has watched America’s Next Top Model enough times to know the drill and is fascinated by the fact that children her age are allowed to wear lipstick and false eyelashes.
Thankfully, though, Annie is a tomboy at heart and thinks the whole thing is pretty stupid.
The website for the contest claims the emphasis of the pageant is not physical beauty but ‘the beautiful inner person that should reside in everyone — without the designer dresses and diamonds’.
If anyone in this room here today is bothered about inner self–development, I’ll eat my long-lash mascara. There’s enough make-up in one room alone to keep the female cast of The Only Way Is Essex going for an entire series. Every little girl here has at least three suitcases (pink, naturally) stuffed with outfits, hair accessories, shoes and jewellery.
As I watch my daughter unpack her one bag, bravely shrugging off incredulous stares from the others, I worry — and not for the first time — about the ethics of what I’m asking her to do.
Annie is competing in the Miss UK Cinderella category for girls aged six to 10. There are three other categories — the most shocking being the one for girls aged three to six. There’s one for those aged 10 to 13, and another for 13 upwards.
Contestants are required to wear three outfits, culminating in a ‘formal’ dress (akin to Katie Price’s pink meringue wedding gown) accessorised with shoes, diamante-studded hair pieces and Swarovski crystals.
It’s a day out that can cost upwards of £1,000. Some parents have travelled from far-flung corners of the U.K.; but the real cost is the outfits.
Many mothers have shipped their daughters’ dresses over from America, homeland of OTT, and paid anything between £200 and £300 for them. Add to that the cost of entry, two other outfits — one for the talent section and one casual — shoes, accessories, tiaras and hairpieces and you’re looking at a very expensive hobby indeed.
I’ve had a team talk with Annie and we have agreed that while it’s important she doesn’t stand out too much during the pageant, she will be wearing a borrowed dress, clothes from her own wardrobe and a tiara from our dressing-up box.
My one concession is to allow her to be made up — but I can’t help feeling more than a little disturbed at the sight of my pre-pubescent daughter with blusher on her cheeks, and wearing false eyelashes and lipstick.
The three judges take their seats as Diana Hare makes a little speech about how the Cinderella Pageant is different from all the other pageants because it focuses on ‘learning, being yourself and being happy’.
As I look at Annie, standing in heels and waiting nervously in the wings, it occurs to me that all my daughter has learnt this morning is how to apply self-tanning lotion to her legs without streaking around the ankles. And I know, for a fact, she’d be happier outside in the fresh air, on her bike or climbing a tree.
But all around me the other mothers are lapping it up — nodding and agreeing among themselves that it’s a wonderful thing they’re doing for their daughters.
A woman sitting next to me is here to support her nine-year-old granddaughter Jordan and tells me: ‘It gives them confidence, innit?’
Last year, Jordan narrowly missed out on winning the coveted plane ticket to America to compete in the U.S. pageant, so her grandmother forked out £6,000 from her savings to get her there herself — and took Mum along, too.
‘How did she do?’ I ask.
‘Well, she had points scored against her for not wearing tights,’ the grandmother replies. ‘They’re dead strict over there. But she enjoyed it. That’s the main thing.’
This, in fact, seems to be the line everybody around me is spouting. When I ask the other mothers why they’re encouraging their daughters to take part in a beauty pageant, they all come out with platitudes like ‘It makes her happy’ or ‘She’s developing her self-esteem’.
You could almost be forgiven for thinking I’m chatting to a band of mothers at a Brownie convention, not watching the unsettling spectacle of young girls, dressed way beyond their tender years, sashaying their hips and pouting for England.
Of course, I don’t want to blow my cover, so I nod and agree. But inside I’m screaming: ‘Get me out of here!’
The competition starts with the so-called ‘casual wear’ category — a chance for the girls to show the judges an outfit they feel comfortable in and which reflects their personality.
Three contestants — Tempest, Persia and Diamond — totter up to the stage, wiggling their tiny hips and striking poses for the judges. Even if you’ve seen it all before in films such as Little Miss Sunshine about U.S. child pageants, it’s even more shocking in reality. None of girls is dressed ‘casually’. In this warped world, it seems that ‘casual wear’ for a child is an all-in-one Lycra jumpsuit with sequins.
One girl, aged nine, holds the microphone with casual expertise as she tells us all she’d like to be known for ‘promoting natural beauty around the world’. It turns out her mother is the female compere of today’s show.
Another contestant is the daughter of one of the organisers. I am beginning to sense a theme here — particularly when, later in the day, both these girls are awarded first prize in their different age groups.
My daughter is next and I can’t help feeling a rush of nerves because I desperately don’t want her to care about what, I realise, is going to be an inevitable outcome.
Annie strides forward onto the stage. When asked what her favourite television programme is, she replies: ‘Are You Smarter Than A Ten-Year-Old?’ Ha. That’s my girl.
For her talent, she is singing Somewhere Over The Rainbow (we couldn’t quite master baton-twirling in time). Despite the fact she seems to be enjoying all the attention, I confess I’m still worried.
First, about the effect all this is having on her; and secondly, that she might decide she quite enjoys it. So far, she has been clapped and cheered by the audience in just the same way as all the others.
Between each round there’s a mad dash to change outfits, curl hair and apply lip gloss. The room is unbearably hot and tempers fray. I hear one mother coaching her daughter: ‘When they ask who your biggest influence is, say it’s Michelle Mone.’
‘But Mum,’ the girl says, ‘I’ve never heard of her.’
I can almost understand why a little girl would want to spend her Sunday glammed up and pretending to be a model (although Annie is increasingly bored). But why are these parents indulging them in what is, at best, shallow — and, at worst, worryingly sexually precocious?
As the judges retire to consider their verdict, I reflect on what I’ve witnessed today; a contest that is, in my view, exploitative, but also questionably run.
I feel ashamed to have exposed my lovely girl to a world where she has been scrutinised for what she looks like — not as the funny, loveable person she is.
As the trophies are handed out and Annie, who has come last, is left standing alone on the stage, looking awkward, I feel like the biggest loser of all.
Of course Annie wasn’t expecting to win — but what 10-year-old girl wants to feel she hasn’t made the grade because her dress isn’t sparkly enough or her hair done quite right?
Then she winks at me and I know — thank goodness — that she couldn’t care less.
It’s the other little girls — and particularly the winner, who will doubtless go on to a wearying array of further such pageants — who I feel really sorry for.
