Former Miss Universe Margaret Gardiner launches empowering website for women

South African journalist and the first woman to be crowned Miss Universe in South Africa, Margaret Gardiner, recently launched her own website and newsletter as a way to celebrate her 66th birthday on August 21.

Gardiner’s career has been nothing short of a hit, with her success spreading across multiple fields and not just as a beauty queen.

She is also an accomplished author, a model and has worked with Hollywood’s A-list celebrities such as Angelina Jolie and Zendaya.

In a conversation with “Independent Media Lifestyle”, Gardiner shared the reason why she decided to launch the “www.margaretgardiner.com” website and newsletter.

Gardiner revealed that most women find themselves being subjected to bullying, and as someone who was bullied as well, she thought of creating a safe space for women.

“After I was bullied on social media, a lot of women wrote to me about their own experience.”

She added: “Women carry a lot of internal pain about their looks, their psychological trauma, and they beat themselves up about things that we are facing together.”

“I'm hoping to start conversations where women are kinder to themselves. There will be frivolous fashion, body discussions, and encouragement."

“I want to celebrate the union of women. But also to talk about some of the issues we face. There is grace in maturing, but there is also pain. Let's talk about both,” she shared.

Gardiner said that she is hoping to encourage confidence through her platform.

“So I want to talk about things women hide and hurt from and encourage confidence.”

On what the website will entail, the beauty queen revealed that it will be a community of like-minded people.

“A sisterhood of like-minded people who build others. Look, if three women sign up and are encouraged to feel better about themselves, then that's a win,” she said.

In 2025, Gardiner released a book titled “Damaged Beauty: Joey Superstar”. When asked how she feels about the significant response of the book, she’s grateful for the interest that people were interested in it.

“I'm grateful to people for being interested. I knew it would be a challenge because it is written in literary language and it's like a setwork book in that there is the surface, but really it is a psychological construct of a woman in pain, how she acts out. 

“The outrageous things that happen to her and how she finds the courage to fight back,” she added.