Who was it that decided ‘plus size’ was the size category for the majority of the female population?
It has such derogatory connotations and is therefore too tricky to turn that ‘plus’ into a positive – more or better or gold star or elephant stamp…
I read a piece in the Guardian recently by Kirstie Clements
(ex Vogue Australia Editor) where she talked about working with models who by the end of a days shoot were so weak they didn’t even have the strength to sit up – and how there was a practice of eating tissues (they swell in the stomach) to stave off hunger.
Somewhere in the 90’s models and film actors were required to be skeletal – Claudia Schiffer or Elle Macpherson compared to the equivalents now are positively robust!
This thinness is justified by designers as a requirement for their clothes to hang and drape properly, for the clothes to look great.
If garments look best on a body as distorted as a fashion drawing and the majority of women are 2 or 3 or 4 sizes bigger than the original product – what is going on or going down?
Historically humans have always practiced body alteration – from scarring to stretching to squashing and more to attempt to look like an idealized norm which on reflection now is often flabbergastingly ugly.
What is it in us that doesn’t accept the multitudinous differences in our shape size and colour?
Why is it so difficult for us to be comfortable in and with our bodies?
Marketing wise we at BETTY DIAMOND have certainly suffered from using a size 12/14 model for our photographs. We’re immediately relegated to the plus size category (even though we make a 10) but it seems unless you put your range on a skeleton you are not counted as fashionable or stylish and certainly not aspirational – that is, wanting to celebrate your incredible good fortune as a strong, healthy woman.