I’d thought that I would do a long post on the whole too thin vs. normal model thing that I’ve been reading about as of late. However, since the whole controversy has been going on for at least a week, it just seemed like old news.
I figured I could sum the whole thing up as follows:
1. Spain is right -- the models walking down the runway right now are little more than walking skeletons – THAT should be apparent to any but the blind. So much so, that after looking at pictures of the fall and now spring collections, my eyes began to hurt – that’s how painful all those boney knees were lookin’. And it does become a distraction at some point – you’re looking harder at the model and wondering what the hell is up with how she’s looking than you are at the clothes!
2. Fashion is one of the only places that misrepresentation of your wares is acceptable – because it is just plain misrepresentation to display clothes for women on little girls who are not only bone skinny, but mostly 13 – 18 year olds as if they will look that good on your customer – 30 – 60 year olds who are the ONLY ones who have the money to buy these things!
As for the designers complaining that it will interfere with their “creative vision” if they have to pick models with a more “normal” (I’m thinking normal for most women 5‘ 3” these days is more like 130 – 40 lbs rather than 125 lbs – but I guess you have to start somewhere…) models – well that’s just an admission on their part that they can’t really create clothes that look good on women as they actually exist in the world.
3. Women are as much to blame for this sorry state of affairs as any designer is. We not only tolerate this nonsense – we encourage it by oohing and ahhing over these collections and, where the dollars are there, buying the clothes. Why? – Because very few women can face how they really look. We WANT to believe that these clothes will make us look like those “willowy” young things on the catwalk – when a simple, unvarnished look in the mirror would dispel that fancy in a hurry! But how many of us (myself included) can really bring ourselves to do that? Instead we usually end up doing one of two things:
a. Putting ourselves in clothes which make us look absolutely ridiculous or
b. Giving up and allowing ourselves to look like something the cat dragged in.
What we should do, in my humble opinion, is dress ourselves honestly – in other words, take an honest look at ourselves, find ways to dress ourselves that take advantage of our good points (and every woman alive has some good point she can play to!) and minimizes the things that, frankly, we wish we didn’t have to deal with. And we should reward those purveyors of clothing that display their clothing honestly – on various sized models and mannequins that really allow you an idea of what these outfits will look like on real women. (Yeah, yeah it will be a shock all the way around – but get over it!)
We’d all live – and dress - a lot saner for it.
(And yes, this still ended up being rather longer than I intended!)
