Friday 21 September 2007

Fashonista? Fashionasty!

I was reading in the Metro this morning (and indeed the Lite last night) about Jen Hunter.

Jen Hunter is a lovely looking girl who featured on one of those reality TV shows… find me a model, make me a model… something like that. Jen is noted because she refused to take any notice of the judges opinions that she ought lose so weight… and although I don’t believe she won the competition she still got a modelling contract.

Jen is in the news now because she has moved modelling agencies… she wasn’t getting the work she wanted so she has moved to an agency who specialise in ‘plus size’ models. So how large is this ‘plus size’ model. Size 18? Size 16? Size 14? Nope. Size 12. Which I believe I still the average size for ladies in this country (oh, to be size 12 again).

It is a pretty twisted world when a gorgeous curvy model… who looks to me like the aspiration of us all has to go to a ‘plus size’ agency to get the right sort of work. I’m not a size 12… nowhere near. I can’t shop in most High Street chains as their idea of an upper size is a 16, an 18 if you are lucky. I wouldn’t want to anyway.

The whole ‘size 0’ debate came from one place. The fashion designers. The reasons that models want to be size 0 is that is who the clothes are designed for. Goodness knows why. That isn’t the shape that most girls are, or the shape nature intended us to be! Who wants to look like an ironing board with no bust and no hips.

Bring back the 50s silhouette, that is what I say. Celebrate the fact that women’s’ figures don’t look like pre-pubescent boys! The problem is though… that is what clothes are designed for. Straight up and down. No discernable difference between waist and hips. Fashion chains with their catwalk rip-offs (or celebrity designed ranges) just proportionally increase the size of clothes as the size goes up. That means if you are a curvy size (bigger than a 10 usually) you will get a dress, or a pair of trousers which will fit you at the hips and gape at the waist. You will have to wear a belt to keep up your trousers which then bunches the material in a most unattractive manner! Or you’ll have to dress like a hoodie with your trousers unattractively sited at your lower hips!

I celebrate Evans and M&S. They admit that a woman has curves and design clothes to match. Trousers fit and the hips and the waist! I shun the likes of Top Shop and New Look (not least because they don’t stock my size) but because they only pay lip service (if any) to the idea that a woman should not be a size zero ironing board! We have campaigns for about everything else these days… so how about one for bring back the 50s figure… women – take back your curves