Too much like a model to model

[emmelinemay]

I watched Find Me The Face - Plus Sized Girl the other day, as I was ill in bed.

'Find Me The Face' has a fairly simple premise, two model scouts are given a brief by a model agency - 'Plus size girl', or 'Urban boy', then they have a week to find people on the street to come to a casting. Based on the photos, they choose 2 each to have some pro photos and go to a go-see, and then the best one gets a modelling contract. It's one of those trashily awful shows which is utterly watchable and engaging, and you hate yourself for enjoying it, and yet enjoy it you do.

'Plus Sized Girl', however, made me rather angry. The final 4 were a mixed bag, the female model scout had 2 quite pretty but not really model material girls; the male scout had found himself one very pretty but un-outstanding looking girl, and a drop dead gorgeous girl with a super trendy hair cut, perfect skin, 6' tall, china doll face and with a really interesting personality. She looked like a model, she looked like she could be in Vogue.

And there lies her problem, and the reason why she didn't make the final two. She looked too much like an editorial model. Apparently, this is no good for plus sized models.

Plus sized models won't get work if they look like actual models, because plus sized girls work in catalogue modelling, Littlewoods, Evans, Dove adverts. Plus sized models aren't for real modelling, not for high fashion, edgy modelling.

The beautiful and perfectly proportioned young girl could have been a model if she was 6' tall and a size 8, but at 6' tall and a size 16 she was either too big to be a model, or too much like a model to be a model.

This INFURIATES me. It's no good saying 'hey, look, big girls can be beautiful too' if the big girls are limited to high street and catalogue modelling, and the pages of Vogue and the like remain full of 6' tall gazelle like women who need to avoid a strong wind in case they break. All this does in re-enforce that big girls can be pretty, but not exceptional beauties, and that big girls have no place in fashion.

Comments

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

I feel your anger; I've been watching the latest season of America's Next Top Model, and they had one girl on it who is gorgeous (see here and here and here for evidence!), and came in as a plus-sized model, although they were worried she might be a little bit small for a plus-sized model (meaning she's maybe a UK size 12-14). They were then even more worried, because she looked as though she'd lost a bit of weight (she said she hadn't; I suspect better posture and a good haircut made the difference!), so then she was basically a slim but essentially normal-sized girl, and therefore too big to be a model, and too small to be a plus-sized model. She took consistently good pictures (the judges agreed on this) but she got kicked out for basically being a normal, healthy size.

What particularly annoys me is that some of the other girls look _painfully_ thin, to the point of looking unhealthy, but they're the ones offered to us as ideals of feminine beauty; not the curvy, healthy, fit, gorgeous girl that so many more of us could actually sort of try to aspire to!

[ant-girl.livejournal.com]

she got kicked out for basically being a normal, healthy size

That's outrageous. She looks great -- she's not fat, she shouldn't be a plus-sized model, but she *should* be able to be a model.

I was thinking about this the other day as well; when looking through the new Bravissimo catalogue, I notice that they've got a new slightly larger girl modelling for them alongside all the super skinny ones. For me, this completely misses the point, which is not to start including "token fat girls", but to start using models who are a realistic size. Or least a whole range of different sizes! Especially in something like Bravissimo, being aimed as it is at women with big boobs, many of whom might also have big other bits!

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

Bravissimo baffle me a bit. I mean, don't get me wrong, I like their stuff, and I love the fact that someone has gone "Oh, actually, there are lots of women who find it hard to get well-fitting underwear, let's cater to them".
But I bought a vest-top from them recently, and while it's really nice, and fits well at the bust, it's narrow through the body, and therefore rides up and bunches at the waist on me, as do a lot of tops. I figure I'm at the age now where showing my midriff if a little undignified, at least for work, so I wrote to them, and said I love their clothes but could they consider widening the bottoms of their vests, since a lot of women with curves have curves below the waist as well as above.
They wrote back and told me I'd be glad to know they're making their vests _longer_.
Um... Missing the point much?

Um, sorry, curves-rant!

[yaruar.livejournal.com]

i think there was more to her being kicked out though, she was really uncomfortable with her body (probably due to the whole weight issue) which did come across in the filming and shots. That said she probably would have made a good commercial model for catalog and editorial work.

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

Well, yes, but part of the reason she was insecure about it was that they kept yammering on about her size! Plus, of course, she was surrounded by girls who look as though their arms would just snap like twigs if you brushed past them, but who were somehow being held up as more beautiful than her!

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

It irks me that girls of a normal size are called 'plus' sized and girls who in 'normal' terms are underweight are called normal.

It's one rule for reality, one rule for fashion; and that fashion rule distorts the reality.

[yaruar.livejournal.com]

fashion has never been about reality though, i think the problem is that people have (probably since the supermodels of the 80's leading on from twiggy in the 60's) suddently started seeing fashion as something aspirational which led in turn to the fetishisation of the actual models as architypal ideal people rather than just being clothes horses.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

I think you're absolutely right there. It's the shift in fashion from human coat hangers to role models which is a real problem.

Good point!

I guess a similar thing could be said for the WAGS and reality TV celebrity culture - at some point being famous for simply Being On TV, or being Someone's Girlfriend became something to be aspired to. You can probably blame posh spice in part for one of those, the other? Maybe Jade Goody. It might not be her fault, but I'll happily blame her for anything.

[yaruar.livejournal.com]

although at least in her defence, although supremely lacking in talent Posh was more famous than David when they got together for being in a band, although where that leaves Kerry Katona i don't know...

they did a survery recently i think where they asked kids what their ambitions were and a huge proportion said they wanted to be a celebrity which is the big shift, previous generations wanted to be something where fame was a byproduct of the actual goal rather than the goal itself.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

Wow. At what point, I wonder, did being a 'celebrity' become an actual goal in of itself? When so many people famous for actual *things* complain so much about the fame that their job has brought?

The legacy of reality TV, I guess.

[poggs.livejournal.com]

I would like to say, without disagreeing with your post, that size matters less in beauty than all the things you can't possibly see when you first set eyes on somebody - such as personality for starters.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

This isn't just about beauty though, it's about the fashion industry, and how in a way, it dictates what we see as 'normal' and what we see as 'plus'.

[glamgothruthy.livejournal.com]

it angers me too.. i just have to think about something else... even though i want to be a model ;¬)

[hirez.livejournal.com]

So 'plus sized' models have to ming a bit, so as to reinforce the ideas that (a) you proles can't have the clothes in Vogue so don't even think about it, and (b) 'fat' people are icky and should Know Their Place.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

Or, plus sized girls can be pretty, but not too stunning, as we should feel that their glamour is an attainable sort, whereas high fashion should be unattainable - and who would aspire to be a fatty?

[hirez.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's what I meant. I'm being particularly stupid today.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

I think you had a valid point :)

[suicideally.livejournal.com]

The "plus size" thing is really insidious just for the simple characterisation of anything above size 10 as "plus".

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

Well, quite.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

I think one of the things that makes me angry, now I think about it, is that - as sushidog mentioned above with ANTM - the super skinny size is held up as what is 'normal', and size 14 and up is 'plus' sized, and then you have this whole section of people who are sizes 10 and 12, who are too fat to be thin and too thin to be 'plus'.

Ok, maybe 14 and up is only 'plus' in the fashion world, but having one rule for that and one rule for 'the rest of us' is just confusing - and as yaruar pointed out, nowadays being a fashion model is something to 'aspire' to in a way it never used to be.

So in effect, having a body shape which is totally un-average is being held up as being the way we 'should' look, which is ludicrous, when you think about it.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

16 at 6' is very well proportioned, the girls look totally normal and toned. And yet, they are 'plus' :/

[ashbet]

*nods* It really sucks -- I got recruited for a "normal" modeling agency some years ago, but was then told that I was 3/4" too short to be a plus-sized model (I'm 5'8" and was about a 12/14 at the time), and couldn't be a "regular" catalogue model unless I lost 30 pounds. I laughed and walked out of there!

-- A ;P

[load-of-flannel.livejournal.com]

Ive heard it mooted that 'big' girls (by which I presume you mean have eaten in the past day) might actually fill the clothes they are in.

Which is bad for high fashion because its about the clothes not the model. Those clothes will by and large never appear on the high street looking anything like that. They want a frame to hang garments on. They do not want the garment distracted from by the frame.

So you could look at it as a compliment that big girls dont do 'real modelling' because they might look better than the clothing.

Personally I think whats unhelpful is perpetuating the attitude that being in 'Vogue' is something to aspire to and in some way a measure of attractiveness.

[yaruar.livejournal.com]

in terms of fashion i think it's not even that complex, there is the issue of hang and all but the 'super' models being relatively plan looking elongated clothes hangers, but from a practical standpoint if you have models of normal sizes and within a normal range it would make putting together a show a nightmare as all the clothes would have to be tailored to the individual models rather than having stock sizes which will fit all but the Kate Moss/(Early) Sophie Dahls of this world

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

Have you ever looked at asos.com? They've got a nifty little thinger where you can look at all of the dresses on a catwalk model as she walks up and down.

In theory, a great idea. In practice, there's no way that my looking at a 6'+ size 6 model walking up an down in a dress is going to help me work out whether that item will fit me, at 5'2" and averaging a size 12.

I say 'average a 12' because my hips are a lot bigger than a 12, my ribs a lot smaller. It evens out, but means I can never get dresses that fit.

[emmelinemay.livejournal.com]

well, there's this...I heard about it because they've contacted the LRG asking if we'll go to the Brighton one.

[nyarbaggytep.livejournal.com]

*applauds*
Good rant.