Fashioning Fat: Inside Plus-Size Modeling

by Amanda M. Czerniawski

  In the modeling industry, determining fatness relies on a viewer’s subjective evaluation of another’s body. For example, fashion professionals often have strict and often extreme bodily standards. In April 2009, designer label Ralph Lauren fired model Filippa Hamilton for being too fat.8 At the time, Hamilton was five feet ten inches tall, weighed one hundred twenty pounds, and wore a woman’s size four. While the casual observer viewed her as thin, a fashion professional argued that she was fat. Two other well-known models, Coco Rocha, whom the industry considered “too big” for high fashion at a size four, and Gemma Ward lost work opportunities due to weight gain because they could not fit into the common sample size—a size zero—used for garments in magazine shoots and the runway.9 These cases reveal the range of meanings associated with “fat.” Fashion has one standard and medicine another.

  For the purposes of this book, I define the fat body as any body that is beyond the norm within the context of fashion, i.e., plus size. Typically, the industry considers anything over a woman’s size eight as “plus size.” Therefore, according to fashion, these plus-size models are fat.

  As the average reader could surmise from a single glance at magazine photos of plus-size models, the basic definition of “plus size” in modeling does not match the cultural image of a fat woman.10 Most casual observers of plus-size models would probably not even perceive them as “plus size,” let alone fat.11 Indeed, many of these models are of “average” size and weight; retail industry experts estimate that the average American woman weighs approximately one hundred sixty pounds and wears a size fourteen.12 They are “average” to the ordinary consumer, but, in sharp contrast, they are “plus size” to the fashion industry.

  Size four model Filippa Hamilton alleged designer label Ralph Lauren fired her because she was deemed too fat.

  What Is Plus Size?

  Similar to “fat,” “overweight,” and “obese,” plus size is not measured in absolute terms. There is some inconsistency in the categorization of plus size between the modeling and retail clothing industries, which I discuss further in chapter 3. In light of this variation, when discussing plus size, I refer to the retail fashion category defined by the industry itself. Without standardized sizing practices and the added complication of vanity sizing (i.e., size inflation), a static dimensional form of plus size does not exist. Across the booking boards at modeling agencies, plus-size models, too, do not fit a particular mold. This is in sharp contrast to “straight-size” fashion models, whose dimensions must fall within clearly established guidelines.13

  While plus size, itself, is a fluid construction that has been created and shaped over time, for the sake of argument, I use the baseline for the quantification of plus size as the woman’s clothing size ten, based on the scale used in modeling agencies with plus-size divisions.14 This practice within modeling agencies does not line up with the retail clothing definition of plus size. In clothing retail, plus-size retailers generally start their merchandise at a size fourteen and run through size twenty-four. Super-size apparel begins at size twenty-six or 4X to 6X.15 Table 1.1 lists the range of measurements associated with retail clothing sizes.

  Generally, plus-size models range from a woman’s clothing size ten to size eighteen and need to be a minimum height of five feet eight inches, with a usual maximum of six feet tall; however, most of the plus-size models in the top modeling agencies are size ten to size fourteen. A combination of bust, waist, and hip measurements determine a model’s size, as illustrated in table 1.2. Her measurements need to be in proportion, whereas her hip and waist measurements are at least ten inches apart. For example, the industry standard for a size fourteen model is 44–34–44 inches; few models match this standard exactly. Bodies vary, so the measurements in the table represent the most common measurements associated with each size.

  TABLE 1.1 Retail Clothing Size Chart

  TABLE 1.2 Model Size Chart

  Controlling Images of Fatness

  Presently, our collective fascination with fat, or the “obesity epidemic,” as it is sometimes called, points us toward a body that needs to be tamed and maintained. Evening news anchors remind us that we are in the middle of a fat crisis. Articles debating treatments and preventive measures needed to tackle this much-maligned state of weight inundate newspapers and magazines. Morning and daytime talk shows, such as The Dr. Oz Show and The Doctors, feature entire episodes on the dangers associated with fatness. Both former President George W. Bush and First Lady Michelle Obama promote national programs, such as his Healthier US and her Let’s Move! initiatives, to combat Americans’ expanding waistbands.

  In popular culture, the 2008 Pixar film, Wall-E, portrays the dire consequences of technological dependence on our physical bodies, where we become fat and lazy folk who sit glued to our television screens. In the film, humans feed on fast food, have robots cater to them, and hover around on chaise lounges to the detriment of their own muscles that have atrophied to the point of immobility. While this is an exaggeration for movie effect, and plus-size models do not match that level of fatness, these popular images perpetuate fat myths and reaffirm contemporary bodily aesthetics. For example, in the film, the advertisements for the latest red- or blue-centric fashions contained slender models instead of more representative fat ones. Even in the Wall-E universe where everyone is fat, the fashion models must be thin. Culture, via media, medicine, and state actions, legitimizes ideologies that privilege the thin body and shed an unflattering spotlight on the fat body.

  This negative reading of the fat body not only dominates the flurry of images inhabiting the media landscape, but also manifests itself as weight bias in everyday lived experience. As empirical studies have shown in detail, we equate fatness with a lack of self-discipline, laziness, and even stupidity.16 Experimental studies on weight bias point to the pervasiveness of negative attitudes toward fat in multiple settings including employment, education, healthcare, and the media, which impact the impressions and expectations others have for fat individuals.17 Contemporary American society discriminates against fat, a point made clear in one study where even fat respondents showed an implicit preference for thin people, as well as an implicit stereotyping of fat people as lazy.18 Likewise, in a study of health professionals, obesity specialists exhibited significant anti-fat bias, associating the stereotypes of “lazy,” “stupid,” and “worthless” with fat people.19

  Contemporary scholars in the field of fat studies, such as Pattie Thomas in her sociological memoir Taking Up Space: How Eating Well and Exercising Regularly Changed My Life, aim to confront many of these myths. Some of these include the belief that those who are fat are unhealthy, androgynous, asexual, incompetent, jolly, lazy, ugly, and bitchy. Those who are fat suffer from a mental illness. Fat is unwanted or a defect, a symbol of gluttonous obsessions, unmanaged desires, and moral and physical decay. The fat body is one that is out of control and takes up too much space. Fat is evidence of a failed body project. These controlling images of fat are rife with moralistic innuendos that place blame on the individual and ignore culture’s impact on constructing bodily ideals.

  For the everyday fat woman, these controlling images of fat impact her relationship with, first, a body that the culture teaches her to scorn and, second, other people who see only her fat. According to sociologist Erving Goffman, the physical body is a manageable material resource that also mediates the relationship between self and social identity, with social identity defined as the reconciliation between how individuals see themselves and how society sees them. Physical appearance tells us about people, i.e., who they are and how we can expect them to act.20 While Goffman maintains that a certain level of human agency is required in the management of the body, it is society that attributes meaning to the body, which then opens individuals to categorization and classification. Stigma, therefore, is the reflection of society’s views and prejudices. In the case of the plus-size model, the presence of “too much” flesh is stigmatizing.21 Havin
g failed to meet the expectation of a normative thin feminine aesthetic, plus-size models face prejudice and discrimination.22 They then have the option to either accept their stigmatized state of fatness or do something about it. These plus-size models reject the negative social construction of fatness. They seek to fit into the domain of fashion and overhaul its presentation of fat—a presentation that is inconsistent, at best.

  Within fashion, the fat body is nearly invisible and relegated to the niche market of plus size. In rare exceptions when larger bodies do appear in fashion magazines, the images often fetishize the fat body or assign it to a special “curvy” issue as a sales marketing feature. For example, a top plus-size model, Crystal Renn, was the subject in an editorial spread shot by photographer Terry Richardson for Vogue Paris’s 90th anniversary issue in 2010. In this fashion editorial, Richardson photographed Crystal Renn engaged in a gluttonous feast consisting of platters full of bloody meats, squid, chicken, piles of spaghetti, an abundance of grapes, and a massive wedge of cheese. This series of images depicts a plus-size model doing what many traditional fashion models cannot—eat. Here, the photos reveal a fat woman at the height of sensual pleasure—satisfying her massive appetite. A defiant Crystal shoves food down her throat; yet, the excess of food elicits disgust from the audience.

  Images of plus-size models often fetishize the fat body. Here, plus-size model Crystal Renn engages in a gluttonous feast of spaghetti in Terry Richardson’s fashion editorial in Vogue Paris, October 2010.

  In contrast to fetishizing the fat body, two magazines attempted to use glamour to appeal to a larger audience. Tucked near the back of Glamour Magazine’s September 2009 issue was an image of plus-size model Lizzie Miller. The photograph showed her smiling and casually sitting in her underwear. The image itself was only a three-inch square but made quite the impression on readers because it exposed her “normal” belly and stretch marks. In response to a boost in sales and a flood of encouraging emails where readers clamored to see more women with “normal” bodies within the pages of the magazine, the editors of Glamour followed up with a photo spread featuring a number of naked plus-size models in their November 2009 issue. The models were Kate Dillon, Ashley Graham, Amy Lemons, Lizzie Miller, Crystal Renn, Jennie Runk, and Anansa Sims. PLUS Model Magazine also featured models Emma Meyer, Laura Johnson, Liris Crosse, Wyinetka, and Ivory Kalber in the nude in its October 2012 issue, which was aimed at confronting the topic of body shaming.

  The mission of fat activists and scholars, like Thomas, Farrell, and the plus-size models who are the focus of this book, is to challenge contemporary bodily aesthetics that privilege the thin body and to demonstrate that fat can be desirable, sexual, and healthy. Instead of these fetishized, sensationalized, or what one of the plus-size models described as the preexisting “happy fat chick” image, where a fat woman distracts attention away from her body with a smile that hides any self-loathing, plus-size models want to be captured in images that are edgier and sexier, evoking the pinup girls from the 1950s. They work to reclaim the pejorative term—fat—with pride.23 They want to exert control over the cultural discourse on fatness much in the same manner that existing controlling images of fatness have dominated their lived experience. I join them and hope this book serves as a call to speak about the very bodies that are ridiculed, marginalized, silenced, and made invisible in our culture.24

  This book sheds light on the struggle of a minority group working within an occupational structure that privileges a thin body type. Plus-size models fight to get out from the margins and into the mainstream fashion market. Their challenge is to maintain their authentic voice as fat women amidst a stream of voiceless bodies that flow in and out of fashion’s ranks.

  Plus-size model Lizzie Miller’s “belly shot” in Glamour Magazine, September 2009.

  As plus-size models engage in a coup d’état of normative feminine bodily aesthetics, can they topple the tyrannous reign of slenderness in fashion? To effectively alter contemporary bodily aesthetics and the controlling images that follow, these models need to go beyond achieving increased visibility in the field but to also take ownership of those images. Instead of conforming to fashion’s demands, they need to direct them. Their sheer visibility in the fashion marketplace is not enough because of the engendered nature of bodies and the threat of disembodiment.

  Disembodied Feminine Bodies

  Western consumer culture increasingly views the body as an individual project and primary site for the construction of both gender and class identity. Women, in particular, experience their bodies as not solely for their pleasure and amusement but as under the constant gaze of others, i.e., a body-for-others experience. Our culture places a high premium on the look and shape of women’s bodies, as they are visible signs of moral status, gender and sexuality, race and ethnicity, and class position.

  Because of the structures and organizations of modern American society, the dominant class, that is, a privileged group with high social and economic capital, establishes and maintains a bodily aesthetic in order to reinforce class distinctions. Sociologist Pierre Bourdieu argues that deliberate modifications to the body, the ultimate “materialization of class taste,” serve to manufacture visible class distinctions.25 This is done by way of bodily forms, modes of dress, and even mannerisms. Members of a dominant class place a high value on beauty because they possess the very resources needed to achieve it—time and money. They strive to improve their bodies and appearance in order to visually manifest their superiority to those who are ruled by needs, not wants. Body image, therefore, is more than a subjective representation of the self but also infused with a calculated objective. For example, a woman, aspiring for membership in the dominant class, may invest in physical improvements and follow a “cult of health” in order to make herself look like the dominant class.26

  Increasingly, women have gone from being judged on their “good works” to being judged on their “good looks.” As feminist philosopher Sandra Bartky argues, the dominant culture specifically constructs the female body as an object to be watched, whereby women discipline themselves in order to achieve modern-day aesthetics. Trapped in a narcissistic world of images, women monitor, invest in, and manipulate their bodies, with beauty as the primary goal. In The Beauty Myth, Naomi Wolf argues that “beauty” does not objectively or universally exist. Rather, it is a political tool used to repress women and, thus, maintain masculine domination, as evidenced by the strict bodily standards imposed by cultural institutions such as fashion and the greater magnitude of body projects aimed at women. Western consumer culture directs more attention to the looks of women’s bodies than men’s. In the pursuit of beauty, women engage in body regimes to cultivate their physiques at the disproportionate expense of their time, money, and other interests.

  Wolf speaks of this cycle of cosmetics, beauty aids, diets, and exercise fanaticism that serves to imprison women in their bodies, bodies that continually require new products and procedures to repair any possible “imperfections.” The nature of these regimes, however, is culturally specific. While white, upper-class women in the United States may limit their caloric intake and undergo cosmetic procedures such as liposuction to remove unwanted fat, some mothers in Mauritania force-feed their young daughters in order to gain fat and make them more attractive.27 In a study of ethnic and racial differences in weight-loss behaviors among adolescent girls in the United States, African American girls were less likely to engage in weight-loss behaviors than the white girls in the study.28 This difference is more striking in light of the corresponding finding that both underweight and normal weight white adolescent girls were twice as likely as African American girls of similar weight status to indicate attempts to lose weight. These patterns of behavior are commonly attributed to differences in cultural standards for acceptable weight among various racial and ethnic groups.29 Trends in cosmetic procedures also reveal racial and ethnic differences in what is considered ideal; for example, Dominican women re
quest to have their buttocks lifted and Italian woman want their knees reshaped.30

  Western consumer culture, aided by the fashion, cosmetic, and medical industries, perpetuates a normalized discontentment toward women’s bodies by constructing an ideal that is far from the normal, natural body. In the domain of fashion, a white feminine aesthetic that values extreme thinness is the standard.31 When non-white models do grace the fashion runway, often it is in the context of adding a little “flavor” or diversity to the show; the focus is on their exoticism. This also occurs in popular film, where filmmakers place greater emphasis on the breasts, hips, and buttocks of Latina and African American actresses.32 These bodies, signifying a racialized exotic sexuality, are meant to contrast with the normative, thin white bodies. In fashion, this image of beauty reproduces hegemonic ideas of gender, sexuality, race, and class.

  As a cultural producer with global reach, fashion serves as a “cosmetic panopticon,” shaping norms and expectations of physical appearance across the spectrums of race, sexuality, and class.33 In this cosmetic panopticon, many women experience a pressure to achieve this ideal at the risk of cultural rejection. They become objects in their own projects of becoming. As evidenced by the escalation of techniques aimed at manipulating the physical body devised by the cosmetic, weight-loss, and medical industries, this cosmetic panopticon rewards compliance with a thin ideal and intensifies the horrors of a fleshy existence. Therefore, these women begin to hold themselves accountable for the proper display of their bodies before the fashion police chastise them for their personal failings. They toil over their bodies because they have internalized the sense that fashion watches and judges them for their ability to match the ideal aesthetic. With fashion billboards and magazine editorials as their (th)inspiration, these women often find themselves working toward unattainable goals of perfection, for the icons they aspire to emulate are carefully constructed and manipulated by the brush strokes of master aestheticians and computer technicians. Still, many keep trying, like hamsters on a wheel, because failure comes at a price to one’s self-esteem and perceived social position.