Armi Kuusela

When 78 beauties are assembled from the far corners of the globe in order to select the most beautiful girl in the world, the results are bound to be spectacular. And so it was with the staging of the 1952 Miss Universe Beauty Contest.

Unexpected romance is in the air when a young woman from Finnish boarding school meets an American millionaire.

Armi Kuusela is sitting in front of the fireplace in her fur coat during a language lesson, the male teacher asks her to speak English, Armi offers her a bowl of Budapest sweets and the man also makes the mistake of speaking Finnish. Three young women having coffee in the living room, one reading, the other taking Budapest. At home, she reads the script aloud and eats a cocktail chocolate bar.

The true-to-life story of Miss Finland Armi Kuusela who was crowned Miss Universe in the first Miss Universe pageant held in 1952. In 1953, some nine months after she won the Miss Universe title, Armi was invited by the Philippine International Fair Committee to crown that year’s Miss Philippines, in the course of her stay, she met Virgilio Hilario, a Filipino businessman, through a blind date in Baguio, the two were eventually married in Tokyo that year. Kuusela chose to relinquish her crown shortly before her reign ended as Miss Universe