Wheelchair athlete wins modelling competition
Coquitlam woman chosen to be face of new perfume
A Coquitlam wheelchair rugby player is breaking down barriers in the fashion world as the new face of a national modelling campaign.
Canadian cosmetic company Lise Watier has chosen Jessica Kruger, 21, as the winner of its nationwide contest in search of a face for the Something Sweet perfume.
“It’s a little surreal still, but very exciting,” said Kruger, speaking on the phone from Montreal while in the hair and makeup chair ahead of her first photo shoot Thursday.
Kruger, along with the rest of the top five finalists, spent the past week in Montreal being interviewed by a panel of Lise Watier executives before she was announced as the winner Wednesday.
The top five were chosen based on the number of votes they received on the contest website.
Kruger, who is quadriplegic, is the only disabled contestant among the five finalists.
Becoming the face of a fashion campaign fulfils a teenage dream of Kruger’s, who once sent a portfolio to a modelling agency before her accident, but never heard back.
When a friend suggested she apply for the Lise Watier contest, Kruger said she initially wanted to do it just for fun. But as more people showed their support, Kruger said she realized the potential to make a difference as a disabled model.
“It became an awesome opportunity to educate the community and people on disabilities, and to show people that somebody in a wheelchair could be a model or in a magazine,” said Kruger, who is also studying English and education at Simon Fraser University.
Kruger became quadriplegic when she was 15. While working a summer job as an exterior house painter, she fainted and fell off a ladder from the second storey of a home.
A CT scan showed her neck was broken in four places, and she was told she would never walk again. Paralyzed from the armpits down, Kruger still has some function in her arms, but her right hand is weak.
After her accident, Kruger found a new passion for life when she started playing the aggressive sport of wheelchair rugby, often dubbed “murder ball.”
She is now Canada’s youngest female wheelchair rugby player, and plays for the B. C. team with hopes to one day be on the national team.
Trading in her rugby bruises for the runway is a serious shift, a fact that has not been lost on her mostly male murder ball team members, she said.
“I’m being taunted constantly, but it’s friendly taunting,” Kruger said. “They’re all really encouraging.”