JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 A Jacksonville fashion designer and community organization are making sure Jacksonville teens don\u2019t miss their prom night because of costly formal wear.<\/p>\n
Fashion designer Arminius Patterson, owner of Audacious-by-Arminius, has launched a generous initiative to provide free suits and blazers to local students. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur goal is to give away over 100 suits and blazers,\u201d Patterson said, showcasing his shop\u2019s racks filled with bold colors and custom designs that are sure to turn heads.<\/p>\n
Making Dreams Affordable<\/p>\n
For Patterson, the initiative is deeply personal. \u201cI know how it feels to want to look nice,\u201d he explained. \u201cSo I\u2019m glad that we\u2019re able to help them out and put a smile on their face, just to add joy and hopefully they can enjoy their prom night.\u201d<\/p>\n
The impact is already evident. Joshua Wilbert, one of the students benefiting from the giveaway, expressed his gratitude: \u201cFeel great… they\u2019re doing great things, giving out free power suits so my mom\u2019s got to do too much for prom.\u201d<\/p>\n
His mother, Krystal Wilbert, noted her son\u2019s excitement about Patterson\u2019s unique designs: \u201cHe likes different colors, like, just different looks. So when I look through his page, I\u2019m like, \u2018oh, yeah, we\u2019re going.\u2019\u201d She added, \u201cWe\u2019re just thankful that he offered this giveaway and my son\u2019s been doing really good this year and he got a sweet blessing to top it off.\u201d<\/p>\n
Expanding Access to Formal Wear<\/p>\n
The spirit of giving extends beyond suits. The Duval Babes organization has also stepped up, hosting a prom dress giveaway to ensure no student misses out on the celebration.<\/p>\n
April Lewis, founder of The Duval Babes, understands the financial strain prom can put on families. \u201cFor me it was a milestone and a burden as a teen mom and it\u2019s a lot of burden on financial households,\u201d Lewis said. The organization\u2019s mission is to \u201ctake the burden off of the students and their parents.\u201d<\/p>\n
These community initiatives are about more than just providing formal wear\u2014they\u2019re about building confidence and creating lasting memories for Jacksonville\u2019s youth during one of high school\u2019s most memorable occasions.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 A Jacksonville fashion designer and community organization are making sure Jacksonville teens don\u2019t miss their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":201687,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[502,116,118,117],"class_list":["post-201686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-community","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201686\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201687"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}