The completely amazing Diamond Duchess was hard at work during the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl bedazzling many of the NFL FASHIONISTA wives so they sparkled in Indianapolis while rooting for their husbands during the big game.
Bianca Wilfork, wife of New England Patriots DT Vince Wilfork, commissioned the creation of a pair of boots encrusted with 6000 swarovski crystals that could be worn two ways.
Bianca also asked the Diamond Duchess to create 10 swarovski MHK pins which she gave as gifts to Patriots owner Robert Kraft and the Kraft women, all of whom wore the special pins to the game. MHK is the initials of Robert’s much loved wife, Myra Hiatt Kraft, who died this past summer. Patriots defensive end Vince Wilfork had a tradition on gamedays for the first seven years of his NFL career. Wilfork, a Boynton Beach native whose parents died within a six-month span in 2002, would find owner Robert Kraft and his wife Myra in the locker room after each game and give each a kiss on the cheek.
How Vince and Bianca met…
In 2011, a lot of people use the internet as the new way to date and meet that “special someone.” You hear some romantic and heartfelt stories of people meeting their soul mates, but more often than not you hear internet dating horror stories. Thankfully for Bianca and Vince Wilfork, their story qualifies as material for the next box office romantic drama!
Ten years ago, Bianca was a single hard working mom living in Miami trying to make ends meet and raise her son the best she could. She frequently used a social networking site to keep up with her friends in Gainesville when she received a random message from some “weirdo” named Vince (with no profile picture, might I add) asking her to call him.
They became friends over a two month period of long phone conversations.
When she finally went to meet him, for strictly platonic friendship intentions, at the University of Miami where he was on the football team, something happened that made her fall madly in love with him – when she was being introduced to one of Vince’s friends, Santonio Thomas, and his first question to her was, “Where is your son, D’Aundre?” Vince had talked so much about her to his friends that they even KNEW her son’s name! From that moment on, she knew Vince was her soul mate.
Years later on a cruise to the Bahamas, Vince proposed to her in their cabin, although Bianca felt as if they were married from that day at the University of Miami when she fell in love. A marriage ceremony was just a formality in her mind.
Leah J. Miller made her name as a personal designer and custom outfitter to MLB, NBA and NFL families with the launch of Bella Artistry. Known affectionately throughout the professional sports industries as “The Diamond Duchess”, she has been custom tailoring and embellishing the official jerseys and wardrobes of ballers’ significant others and children with Swarovski crystals since 1999. Her designs have been featured in the 2008, 2009, and 2010 HBO Hard Knocks football training camp special as well as the Washington Post, and the Diamond Duchess will make her debut as a Costume Designer this Fall for the ABC-TV drama Ghostbreakers. You can learn more about Bella Artistry and see many of Leah’s creations by clicking here.
