Meet Ms Doncaster Galaxy, the model putting her home city on the map

Meet Ms Doncaster Galaxy, the home town model who will be putting her home city on the map over the next 12 months.

Lindsay Clayton has been selected for the role for the next 12 months - and has a busy schedule lined up representing Doncaster at a string of events.

She said: “Over the next eight months, I want to use my title to do more than simply wear a crown and sash.

“I want to use the opportunity to celebrate Doncaster, support local businesses, attend community events and shine a light on the positive people and organisations doing great things across our area.”

Selected via Galaxy Pageants UK, Lindsay said: “I specifically chose to represent Doncaster because it is my hometown and it is somewhere I’m incredibly proud to call home.

“I have already started building relationships with local businesses and organisations, and I plan to attend events and make appearances wherever there is an opportunity to support community initiatives, charities and positive work taking place across Doncaster.

“This is going to be a very personal journey for me as I reflect on growing up and being schooled in both Edlington and Balby, and the journey that has brought me to where I am today.

“I’m hoping to revisit both my primary and secondary schools as part of my journey and, if possible, offer my pageant dresses as an initiative for the secondary 2027 proms.

“I’d love to turn something that has been part of my own journey to inspire and creat opportunity for young people in my hometown.”

She said: “Another important part of my story is that I am autistic.

“There is understandably a lot of negativity around masking when you are a female with autism, but for me, learning how to mask safely has also been one of my greatest skills and assets.

“I can honestly say that without my ‘lifelong’ wardrobe of masks, I don’t believe I would have gone to university, achieved a Master’s degree in psychology, worked as an Assistant Psychologist within the NHS, achieved many of the community initiatives I have over the years, or currently volunteer as a custody visitor at Doncaster Police Station.

Nor would I perhaps have had the confidence to participate in a pageant and proudly represent my hometown. I honestly don’t have the confidence, I just selectively use my masks to my advantage, to achieve the most I can

“In the simplest analogy, my masks are my superpower.

“Professionally, and personally I know masking is a complex and individual experience for autistic people, and I hope that by sharing my own experience, I can offer a different perspective and perhaps show other autistic people that their own skills and ways of navigating the world can also be strengths.”

She said: “I originally attended a pageant with our daughter and was encouraged to consider taking part myself. I found the whole weekend incredibly empowering, and it felt like exactly the positivity I needed at this point in my life.

“I won’t pretend it has all been easy. It has felt very alien and very much outside my comfort zone in so many ways. I’m also exhausted.”