Dowding grew up in Bournemouth, and has a younger sister Melanie. They were brought up Roman Catholic by their Filipina mother Zena, and British father Chris. Leilani was named after her mother's cousin and her name means "heavenly flower". Dowding and her sister attended St Peter's School in Bournemouth. She gained eleven GCSEs and three A-levels. She began an economics degree at Royal Holloway, University of London, in Surrey, with the intention of becoming a city trader. The then-18-year-old entered and won the 1998 Miss Great Britain competition. In Hawaii later that year she became the first woman of Asian descent to represent Britain in the Miss Universe pageant.
Career
After her success in beauty pageants, Dowding dropped out of university to pursue a full-time modelling career. Although she had not originally considered topless modelling, she started appearing as a Page 3 girl in The Sun in 1999. Her younger sister Melanie Dowding also had a brief career as a model. In 2003 she was rated #89 on the FHM Sexiest Women in World list. Dowding has been a guest on various British television shows, modelling on the Big Breakfast and This Morning, and appearing on Faking It, Celebrity Wrestling and Celebrity Fear Factor. She has also enjoyed a season in pantomime as Tiger Lilly in Peter Pan. Dowding appeared on a charity Page 3 episode of The Weakest Link where she lost out in the final round to Jakki Degg. Dowding was competing on behalf of the RSPCA and breast cancer charities. Dowding has competed in celebrity poker tournaments and done promotional work for Ladbrokes. She also appears in the American TV Reality Show Tough Love Miami, in which she deals with her own superficiality in order to find a suitable mate. She has visited Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq and Cyprus on morale-boosting trips for British troops abroad. She appeared in the December 2011 issue of Maxim U.S. TV credits include: The Millionaire Matchmaker ; Million Dollar Listing Los Angeles. Dowding has her own clothing line, the Leiluna Collection.
In 2014, Dowding uploaded a photo of herself dressed as a murdered Native American chief. This was considered extremely offensive by Indian Country Today News.
