Trainee chosen for Miss Universe Great Britain competition

Chloe Lake

^{Chloe Lake, conveyancing trainee and future Miss Universe?}

A trainee solicitor has been picked as a finalist for Miss Universe Great Britain.

Chloe Lake, who works in Wilson Browne Solicitors' residential conveyancing team, is one of around 30 participants selected for the 2023 Miss Universe Great Britain competition in July. The winner will go on to represent the country at the Miss Universe pageant in El Salvador at the end of the year.

Chloe told RollOnFriday that she is "hugely appreciative" of Wilson Browne Solicitors sponsoring her for the competition. "I have felt an immense level of support from my colleagues across all levels," she said. "I think it’s really special that the firm recognises that this is something that I am passionate about and that I can use it as a force for good."

The trainee said she will use the platform "to try and make an impact on the causes" that mean the most to her "such as Mental Health Awareness and Social Mobility."

"I started competing aged 16 as a way to make new friends and grow in confidence," Chloe told RollOnFriday. "I probably came dead last in my first competition – but I loved it," she said. Since then, she has represented Scotland internationally in the USA, and raised thousands of pounds for charities across the UK.

The pageant finalist has supported mental health charity Mind for a number of years. "More recently, I’ve experienced my own struggles, and since recovering from this last year I have been championing discourse around the subject, particularly in the legal profession," she told RollOnFriday.

She also ran the London Marathon this year raising £3,600 for Mind, and has started a fitness based fundraiser, for A-Sisterhood - a charity that supports women in the UK and globally.

Jenny Woodruff, Head of residential conveyancing at Wilson Browne told RollOnFriday: “Everyone at Wilson Browne Solicitors is delighted with Chloe’s achievement in being shortlisted for Miss Universe Great Britain".

Woodruff said that pageant competitions have given the trainee "a platform to raise awareness of the issues she feels strongly about – in particular mental health issues, which is an issue we all need to be aware of when facing the workload and pressures that often exist in the business of law."

“We are a firm that has a strong identity: a firm that embraces equality, diversity and inclusion, and we support our people in as many ways as we can inside or outside of work," said the partner.

In other recent news about legal professionals taking a hobby to another level - last week, an Australian lawyer made the Eurovision final.

Woodruff added: “Chloe perhaps put it best in her own words: ‘competing in pageants doesn’t make me anti-feminist. It’s my way of embracing and celebrating the feminine!’. If we can support her in that, through sponsoring her that can only be a good thing, and her colleagues will be cheering her on.”

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Comments

In my experience, they never work for a proper city firm. It’s always an unknown or in firm which pays sub 90k NQ. As a proponent of diversity, I implore some open minds to this. We could implement a quota or something. Very talented young people like this lady should be given a look in.

*cough*

Wow!!

Urgh. She would make a far greater contribution to Mental Health Awareness by unconditionally disavowing beauty pageants in all their forms. How is it possible we're still hearing about these grot fests in 2023?

Good luck to her - get out of law and make some money.

@Assuredly - its a woman's choice what they do with their bodies.

Best of luck Chloe. It's healthy for lawyers to pursue other interests outside of work and it seems there's a lot of good that she does through this, so fair play and really no need for anyone to knock it!

Well done Chloe! We'll be rooting for you.

Good on her - clients love to be able to google their lawyer and see them in swimwear and heels.

Last June, as a paralegal, she felt she was "spinning too many plates" but now, as a trainee, she has time to add another one? Seems a bit odd.

https://www.business-times.co.uk/articles/legal/i-admitted-to-myself-i-could-not-do-it-all-i-was-spinning-too-many-plates

Hmm (12:00)

Looks like someone was quick to input her name into Google and do a little, ahem, research...

After attending a mandatory training session my comments are restricted to wishing her well in her legal career.

Well done Chloe - hope you win

Give up the day job!

How long before a partner in a magic circle firm is hauled before the SRA for harassing this one?

@15.19 - very long

Not long at all!

Best wishes to her for the competition. Sounds like a nice person.

@15:19 - see you here next week?

Might need a Wednesday edition actually...

@Hmm - she's being doing it since she was 16 - she isn't 'adding any plates'.

@[email protected] - she doesn't work at a magic circle firm, and the SRA are becoming less inclined to interfere in lawyers' personal lives. In any case that type of thing is only likely to happen if someone gets jealous and makes an accusation or pressurises her into doing so.

It's weird the way that some men think not being able to be perverted in public is oppression but put a woman in a swimsuit in a competition with a swimsuit round and they scream that she's doing something transgressive.

"It's weird the way that some men think not being able to be perverted in public is oppression but put a woman in a swimsuit in a competition with a swimsuit round and they scream that she's doing something transgressive."

Do you have any actual examples in mind, or is this just a sweeping generalisation about the kind of men you imagine exist somewhere nonspecific in the UK?