Is the fashion world embracing curves?

Fashion has come a long way, but in all the years of its flashy existence, this world had a dyed-in-the-wool image of depicting slender and tall as “beauty.” Vidit Sehgal, Head (Marketing and IT) and co-founder of LURAP, a platform which makes ‘extra large’ clothing, said, “It is no secret that the global fashion industry is rightfully criticized for accepting only skinny models, be it for walking down the ramp or posing for online shopping websites. Even clothes put for sale on stands inside stores are often restricted to ‘medium’ and ‘small’ sizes. The notion of a woman’s beauty has been formed around the size and shape of her body for millennia, and the idea of fuller-bodied women has been considered visually unappealing.” 

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“This has largely been because of the ‘ideal’ body image set by global celebrities, who have to spend hours on intense fitness workouts every day to look great and slim on the screen or the covers of top magazines. As a result, millions of women aspire to be like them. Those who are not able to fit the existing parameters of ‘slim’ end up feeling marginalized,” he added.

With trends becoming broader and more complex, the images of models got more liberal - women who are not dictated by the norms of fashion world also started gracing the ramps.

According to data from market research firm NPD Group, U.S. sales of women’s plus-size apparel, including those for teens, rose 6 per cent to 21.4 billion dollars in 2016.

 “Despite an average Indian woman wearing a size-M, an average British woman wearing a size 16, and the average female American wearing a size 20, many high-street and premium brands have refused to acknowledge the fact that most women are unable to wear clothes from their catalogues,” Sehgal noted, “But certain recent developments – like a law in France banning the use of unhealthily thin fashion models, Madrid banning anorexic models from walking the ramp and Israel banning models with Body Mass Index (BMI) less than 18.5 per cent – indicate that the mindsets are gradually changing. Many plus-size women are also fervently pushing boundaries and demanding beauty to be all-inclusive.   —ANI