Qristyl Frazier of St. Louis will be among the 16 designers vying to win the next edition of “Project Runway” on the Lifetime Channel beginning Aug. 20.

But the St. Louis native returned home this week not just to celebrate, but to mourn.

Her nephew was gunned down on Thursday Aug. 6. According to the report in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, “Man Killed, Three Shot”:

Armanti Bonner, 20, was shot in the thigh, chest and side while standing in the 5000 block of Minerva Avenue near Sherman Park. Police say witnesses told them that a blue car passed by where Bonner was standing and several men inside began firing weapons at him. Bonner was taken to a St. Louis area hospital, where he died. The investigation is ongoing.

The police are still searching for leads and Frazier’s family is looking to raise funds to support the family he left behind. If you’d like to contribute to the bury or to support Bonner’s toddler son the family is accepting donations at Vantage Credit Union. The name for the trust fund is Angela Frazier for Arvon M. Bonner.

So before Qristyl can celebrate, she’s got to grieve first. Then she’s got to do the only thing she knows how to do: Pray, pick yourself up and keep going.

All the while, she’s already scheduled to make public appearances including a guest spot on “Great Day St. Louis,” on August 21 (the day after the season’s debut) and a visit to her alma mater, Stephens College in Columbia on Aug. 27 (for a viewing of the second episode).

I’ll be featuring her in a profile in my Style Matters column on Saturday (Aug. 15).

She’ll be auditioning local models at a casting call on Tuesday, Aug. 18, from 5 to 7 p.m. at Diversity Gallery, 6161 Delmar Boulevard.  If you’d like to be considered wear heels, jeans and a shirt.

She’s looking for professional models or women who can present themselves that way and are comfortable in front of television camera. Frazier will be looking to recruit four models size 4 to 18.

The photos on this page are two examples of Qristyl’s designs.

Frazier’s specialty are fashions for plus-sizes, but she prefers the term plus-sexy. She said being top heavy or bottom heavy or having full hips is not a crisis, it’s an asset.

“I want people to be healthy, but I also want them to be comfortable now,” Frazier said in an interview by phone from New York.

She said that it’s OK to want to lose some weight or tone up at the gym, but the bottom line is that you still need clothes to wear today and you shouldn’t have to settle for something that’s dowdy or unflattering because you’re hiding.

So she said that people need to celebrate their plus-sexy size with bold colors, prints and styles that fit and flatter.

“Lots of big name designers are afraid to play with silhouettes and colors on a big girl, but that’s a size that I understand,” said Frazier who carries more weight in her chest.  So she doesn’t shy away from vivid fabrics.

“I go to a fabric store and I fall in love with something, but maybe I don’t know what to do with it,” Frazier said. “I’ll drape it across the couch and walk past it for a few days and then one day it’ll come to me.”

You can find Frazier’s line at www.qristylfrazierdesigns.com. She’ll relaunch the site with updated designs to coincide with the launch of the program on Aug. 20.

She will not deny nor confirm any of the show details, but I’m assuming that at the very least, she’s not going to be eliminated in the first two shows if she’s making all these public engagements. But we’ll keep our fingers crossed for her anyway.