Pageant queens Mariana Varela and Fabiola Valentín, who were Miss Argentina and Miss Puerto Rico, respectively, tied the knot on October 28, 2022. The beauty queens had kept their relationship under wraps and only announced it after they got married. The women competed in the 2020 Miss Grand International pageant together. Sounds like something straight out of a rom-com, right?
A pageant turned into a meet-cute for the former contestants at the 2020 competition, which was postponed to March 2021 because of the pandemic, and the rest, as they say, was history.
Varela also competed in the 2019 Miss Universe pageant, where she dazzled in a memorable look for the national costume contest. Both Varela and Valentín bagged a spot in the top 10 of the 2020 Grand Miss International pageant, as they shared in their Instagram bios. And, even though they didn’t go home with trophies that day, it seems they did leave with something much more valuable—the love of their lives! Cue the *awws*.
Varela and Valentín did keep hinting at their secret relationship through Instagram posts over a few months after they met at the pageant, but only referred to each other as “close friends.”
In a birthday post for Valentín that Varela posted in September 2021, she called Valentín her “beautiful friend.” The newlyweds confirmed their relationship and announced their marriage on Instagram a few days ago, and we couldn’t be happier for them.
“After deciding to keep our relationship private, we opened the doors to them on a special day,” they captioned the post, which featured a video montage of special moments in their relationship.
The video included clips of their fairytale proposal and wedding, which appeared to take place in Puerto Rico. Congratulations from Varela and Valentín’s fellow competitors, including 2020 Miss Grand International winner, Abena Akuaba, who represented Ghana in the pageant, and friends came pouring in as soon as their announcement went live. “Omg congratulations MGI brought together a beautiful union,” Akuaba wrote.
Someone turn this into a Disney movie or a cheesy rom-com, already!
