There has been a significant amount of press these last few weeks regarding the disastrously skinny frames of models in the fashion industry. The Ralph Lauren airbrushing scandal caused quite a stir, as did Karl Lagerfeld's statement that he didn't want to see curvy women in fashion. To aggravate matters, we are in The Season -- models are prancing down the catwalks daily in New York, Milan and Paris -- and with each step, media heads continue to gawk and criticize the frames that bring them the fashion.
What I don't understand is: why are we still, after all these years, acting like the reverence of the skinny girl in the fashion world is any kind of news? Models have been tall, skinny and waif-like for several decades now. Twiggy started it, Kate Moss pushed it along, and at this point it is here to stay. Yes we have a few curvy exceptions here and there -- but in my humble opinion -- actually, no, in my totally self righteous opinion -- it would behoove people to stop whining about it and start understanding it.
Fashion is not about the person ... (if you think it is, then you're thinking of style). No, fashion is about the clothes -- the garment itself in all its glory. The higher up you go in the fashion world, the more attention is put into the detail of each garment. And like a chef at a restaurant, each detail must be put together a certain way to create the ultimate presentation. Is a chef going to spend 5 hours on a meal and serve it in tupperware? Getouttaheah! The skinny model is the serving plate to a chef's fancy feast. It displays the hard work, it is impartial, and it allows the focus to be on the main course. This is not to say that there is anything wrong with tupperware in the grand scheme of things! Nobody is insulting tupperwear! It is truly appropriate and welcome on many occasions ... but for some it is simply not. The skinny model is a walking, talking hanger for the clothing. It doesn't stretch it or ripple it or crease it where it is not meant to. It doesn't speak or give its opinion, it doesn't overemphasize certain parts or under emphasize certain parts. The skinny model allows the garment to speak for itself -- no distraction, no confusion, no nothing.
Some might think that the fashion world is making strides away from its obsession with the skinny model. Trust me when I tell you that Glamour Magazine putting a naked "plus size" model on their website is only giving you false hope. Wake up and smell the rice cakes. Skinny is in and it ain't going anywhere. Why get angry? Why take it personally? The fashion industry doesn't give an eff how much criticism they get from the mainstream -- they run things. Have you ever been to a fashion party?! Unless you're in the biz nobody even knows/cares you exist. So go ahead, protest, get mad, get false hope, but it won't get you anywhere. Fashion is for the skinny and this is not inherently catastrophic. It's simply an objective truth ... like eggs taste better with salt. Some people might disagree and enjoy really bland eggs, but it's basically just fact.
I should mention here that I'm not a tall skinny girl (how many times have I mentioned food in this post so far?) -- and I feel like this is worth mentioning to show that it is possible to love fashion for fashion's sake, and accept that skinniness is a fundamental part of all of it. I suggest you join me in my love (or maybe just strive for a bit of acceptance) and embrace the thin limbed ladies who grace our catwalks and magazines. Allow the garments to speak for themselves...support the designers in their quest for perfection and romance and freshness! Give props to the industry for continually reinventing the aesthetics we put on our bodies every day! And if after all that you still can't see that the skinny girl is simply a product of this vast web of ideology, clearly I have not made my point and you will always be a hater. Good luck to you, it takes more energy to hate than to love.
Warm fuzzies to everybody out there, and in defense of skinny models everywhere ... you have my support and I thank you for being so tall and skinny.
Follow Mihal Freinquel on Twitter: www.twitter.com/mihaldot
But what is the point of an excruciatingly detailed high-fashion GARMENT that doesn't look right on anyone who weighs more than 90 pounds? A garment is meant to be WORN, correct? So why put so much effort and detail into a garment that only looks good when hung on a hanger, either metal, plastic or flesh?
Because it's art? If you want to create art, sculpt, paint, write, don't take creative frustration out on women because your fancy needs to be tickled with textiles.
If models "suffer" (writer's words) to maintain the thinness to be hangers for clothes that are
"reinventing the aesthetics we put on our bodies every day! " doesn't that just emphasize the point that these women and designers are fighting against life? Women aren't flat, our bodies are inherently curvy. If you have to suffer or reinvent a natural form, the problem is with fashion, not me.
manly not stuffing my face.I went from 156 to 135 in the last three years gradually. Why did i do this? throwing on a sack and looking hot seems desirable yes?.- .
I've learned to say "F***" it, think outside of carb proportions, have eaten minimally what i want, and i have morphed!
-I find it unfair for people to attack skinny models! They suffer imensly for their bodies in their trade to be placed as a mere hanger with no voice- give em a break.. It seems dumb to attack fashion bodies which most people consider disgusting. LIfe is hard people, what is harder to get has always been sought after-. Why is it that brides are gorging themselves in africa?
trash the mags and mindless entertainment..that spark mindless thinking... buy glamour? people? those I find find much more demeaning- real fashion magazines are beautiful, don't offer sex advice, and leave me feeling refreshed, not inept and insecure in the mens department.
. models are an EXAGERATION that enhance clothes; and do not starve themselves for sexual attractions; but for the sake of the companys success.. if your daughter turns to models for reference wack her in the head and reitterate what is healthy and attractive- lady gaga/ beyonce?! this article rules!
Different viewpoints aside, you seem like a groovy chick. I'd skip the newest belted blouse that Ralph tells me I should love, (or those ugly ass purple Jimmy Choo's) and opt for a spirited conversation with you, any day of the week! Peace.
Thanks for your response. I confess to crushin' on you just a little bit right now. You're the first HuffPo blogger who ever responded to 'lil ole' me.
Perhaps I am arrogant. Good on you for calling me on it. It's just...I'm one of those annoying people who sees very little in life in black and white, and I think I come off as arrogant in my attempts to explain myself. I see the many shades of grey, then further complicate a situation by nurturing a lofty (arrogant?!) notion that if I manage to divine language which facilitates compassion, understanding, compromise and respect, then no matter which side of the proverbial fence one is sitting on, passionate human beings can come to some kind of mutual understanding. Hence my defense of some of what you wrote, while simultaneously disagreeing with the rest. (cont.)
The fact that this post has stirred up so many comments makes me think that people believe that it is the "money grubbing designers preying on impressionable women" that create and perpetuate women's hurt. Let's get real. You wanna talk oppression--let's talk about where it really begins-in our churches, synagogues, mosques, schools and families. Those core institutions that teach us that there is a right way to be and a wrong way to be and that if you don't act right and get with the program you are a bad person, flawed and forever condemned. That's where the really nasty stuff gets embedded. That's where self-hatred is born. If we raise our girls with love, let them know they can be, do, and think anything and still be loved--when it comes time for them to open a fashion magazine they will be able to see it for what it is- designers--who are in the business of setting an aesthetic for fashion.
I have never understood this argument. If it is not about the person, and the skinny model permits the garment to "speak" for itself without distraction or confusion, why do so many models and designers get criticized for using anorexic and unhealthy models? If you want a clothes hanger, use one. When you use a human, you introduce an element of personality. People will always look at the model and I can think of more than one time where an anorexic model was the talk of the town rather than some new design.
You mentioned that "Lagerfeld and Lauren may have BEGUN their careers motivated by noble inspirations of artistic expression, their current level of success in this "artistic" venue leaves me reluctant to believe they remain motivated by such altruisms." I feel you on this, but at the same time, does art have to be noble to be beautiful or right? If it does then a lot of strung out, cheating, lying artists would be kind of effed. Since when can the altruism of art be quantified?
A painting of this blouse would be a completely different piece of art entirely. Just like a sculpture is completely different than a painting of that sculpture. And the models are the displays for these pieces.
Using your "Devil Wears Prada" analogy, the unrealistic version of beauty filters down to a generation of young women who don't know where it originated.
One person's example cannot combat the pervasiveness of mass media. When women are being bombarded every day with thousands of messages from television programs where no one is above a size zero and from advertising talking about burning belly fat fast.
The fashion mags are not honest about what their models look like. All of them are airbrushed and some pictures are composites of multiple girls.
If models can't even be perfect enough to appear in a magazine about fashion as an intact whole, then I don't understand your argument. I agree that women should look to people other than models for their role models, but when a woman like Hillary Clinton is torn down by the media, not because she is ine
Because we're still trying to change that reverence of the skinny girl to something more attainable and less psychologically damaging.
>>>... it would behoove people to stop whining about it and start understanding it.
We DO understand it and we mostly disagree with it. Disagreeing is not whining. Nor is trying to change an unattainable standard.
>>>Fashion is not about the person ... (if you think it is, then you're thinking of style). No, fashion is about the clothes -- the garment itself in all its glory.
Then hire women of all shapes and sizes to carry the clothes on hangers down the runway.
>>>And if after all that you still can't see that the skinny girl is simply a product of this vast web of ideology ...
We DO see that. Again, we disagree with the ideology. We disagree with the methods used to display the clothes. We disagree with the necessity for many models to starve themselves thin in order to be used a clothes hangers. We disagree with having these women held up consistently as the ideal. We disagree with feeling bad b/c we aren't a size 2. We disagree with our daughters having anorexia and bulimia as a result of trying to live up to this ideal.
You said "we're still trying to change that reverence of the skinny girl to something more attainable and less psychologically damaging." Like I said, this is going to be a long road for you. Seek change all you want, the fashion industry runs everything (did you not watch Devil Wears Prada and listen to the speech about the cerulean sweater?). Godspeed to you.
And I would argue that to those paper thin models, it is very real indeed; as it is to the many tweens, teens, and young ladies who are still caught up in appearance for appearance's sake.
So you might want to rethink all those assumptions you made. And while YOU may believe that the fashion industry runs everything, I KNOW that it does not run my life.
Others, however, do. And it would behoove you to realize that others (especially young women and teens) do not have the same grasp on the "it's all an image" ideology as you may.
First of all, the analogy of designers using skinny models the chef not serving food on Tupperware is not convincing. Chefs may not want to serve their food to those who use plastic food containers, but most designers *do* want to sell their goods (their perfume, cosmetic, & jewelry lines if not their clothes) to as many people as they can. Fashion may not care about protesters, but like any other business, it cares about the bottom line. (Or is Karl Lagerfeld offering non-skinny women who bought Chanel makeup a refund?)
Furthermore, if the *only* models used are walking and talking clothes hangers, they offer no guidance whatsoever to most women about how the clothing they are wearing will work for real women in real life. To put that another way: too many designers hide their unworkable, unflattering, and sometimes downright ugly clothes on stick-thin models, so they do *not* offer an impartial display of the designer's work.
Now, I do not believe in personally attacking any of the models who happen to be tall and skinny, so I agree with Mihal that people should not hate on them. But it is high time they were joined by a more diverse selection of women on the catwalk and in the magazines.
And they keep using skinny girls for the runway.It's the place where they show clothes that will be bought in private sales for happy few ,not in stores. They know women on the sidewalk are not the ones buying haute couture.They take pride of the fact that their models are not like women on the street.They consider themselves as the aristocracy of fashion and nomal looking is good for the masses.You've got models for haute couture runways, some for ready to wear collections, some for generic brands (Heidi Klum for Mc Donald, Cindy Crawford for Revlon,Pepsi or GQ).
They love the facts that common people don't look like their uber thin models. I would even say that loud complains feed their snobbery.
I agree with the blogger: skinny girls on runways are here to stay.
The only thing that maybe will change is the horrible and excessive use of photoshop.
but more importantly i believe that fashion is an ART.
i think it's funny that what would be UNTHINKABLE when talking about art is suddenly allowed when talking about fashion. no one would say, about a picasso: "that doesn't look REMOTELY like a woman" or about a giacommetti sculpture "that figure is FAR too skinny."
or about abstract art: "THAT does NOT look like a ___" or "WHY CAN'T I IDENTIFY THAT?"
in the soviet union they had a similar problem: was abstract art accessible to the "normal" person. they decided it wasn't and they came up with soviet realism, a movement which, while historically and culturally interesting, is widely acknowledged to be a low point in art, and human creativity.
if we keep insisting that fashion create clothing for fat people to wear to the supermarket, then maybe artists should stop doing this so-called "art" thing they do that no one understands and start making comprehensible images of so-called "normal" people doing so-called "normal" things that so-called "normal" spectators can "understand."
I like your neutrality Mihal- it is irreverant...you just have a way of saying what most dare not to. You sassy thang. Are you published anywhere else?