Whether you wish to call it a holiday, vacation, break, or simply a getaway, it is a happy time. A time to relax, let the rigours and stresses of our everyday lives just slip away. For a while at least. And yet, for myself and many women this is a double edged blade. What should I pack?, what will the weather be like? Is this acceptable in that culture? If I take these shoes for comfy waking what will I wear with them? These trousers are good for casual but I feel fat in flats and heels will be painful for a day sight seeing, and so on. Before I know it, i'm hitting Google for searches like "What clothes to wear on holiday", this inevitably returns a plethora of trendy fashions and pictures of stick thing women in bikinis, looking all tanned and beautiful. So, feeling a little more deflated I adjust the search "Holiday cloths for real women". Much of the same with the addition of some plus size sites. Great. Now I feel well and truly fat but no closer to finding something to wear. So, giving in I do yet another search, this time just for clothes in general. This is a far more sensible idea. Trouble is though, all these women modelling the clothes are so perfect. Tall and slim, no bumps or lumps in the wrong places. The clothes look wonderful and sophisticated yet casual. Just what I want. Three minutes later, as the happy haze clears, I imagine myself wearing them and all of sudden I realise that fantastic knee length dress on the model will end below my knees and emphasise my much less than flat tummy. Those cropped linen trousers will make me look dumpy, that top will not be practical. I'm back to square one. After a fews hours of this I give up, utterly fed up. This was last night.
So, today, new day, fresh attempt. I hit Google images in the hopes of seeing some pictures to get some inspiration. You see, i'm short, 5"2, but I have a tendency to slouch (I'm told) so that is more like 5" - 5"1. I'm also overweight. Size 14-16 (UK) and I don't have a big bust, although those 2 sizes bigger bra's are wonderful! I have a tummy too and the kindest thing I can say about my shape is "curvy" although in truth, I just think of myself as fat and dumpy. Well, in pages of images I see no models that fit my body shape. I swallowed my pride and hit the plus size clothing sites. Lots to see but something that strikes em is that although the models displaying the clothes are clearly larger women, they are still that "model perfect" shape. You could just take a stick thin model and just make it bigger. They are all the perfect height, perfect shape, no lumps, no bumps, no imperfections at all. They do not look plus size. You have to ask yourself, if they don't look plus size, if they are not the shapes of everyday women, how is this any better than the "traditional" stick thin models? The simple answer is, they aren't.
I really do not understand these clothing companies/designers. Their clothing is made an advertised on women that are not the average. In effect, they are designing for a minority, specialist group which just happen to make their clothing look good. This must mean that they either think that the normal woman is just too stupid to realise they will not look like the model wearing the garments, the customer doesn't matter, or, they only want the perfect shaped woman to buy their clothing. Even those garment designed to hide tummies are displayed on flat stomached models! It isn't even because they don't work because the majority do the job very well. Why then? Why would they not not use real women? I want some idea of what the clothing will look like on ME. Surely it is common sense to use your target audience to advertise?
My dream clothing website.
A page with multiple choice where you can select your body type. Height, bust size, shape, tummy, etc. Then a selection of real models based on your preferences to choose the one who most represents your figure and then, a selection of clothing that they look good in. The customer gets what they want and the designers get to show off their clothing on models who make it look good.
If only women stood together and spoke out. Oh well, in the meantime, i'm going to stop torturing myself online and try a personal shopper.
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