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British Vogue Editor's Lame PR Coup: No More Size Zeros!

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VoxPopuli
06/14/09

In reply to British Vogue Editor's Lame PR Coup: No More Size Zeros!
Retouching models to make them bigger = adding boobs.
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MsMuffinMcGuffin
06/14/09

In reply to British Vogue Editor's Lame PR Coup: No More Size Zeros!
I don't think it's lame at all, I think it's about time someone did SOMETHING. Considering that a size 6 to 8 was once considered healthy and attractive (Hello Cindy Crawford!) and now it's a size 0? Most women don't have that body type naturally because that's the size of a child. Is what we are all supposed to admire and emulate? No wonder so many young girls have anorexia and or bulimia.

I say kudos to Ms. Shulman.
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BookishLookish
06/14/09

@MsMuffinMcGuffin: Yeah, it's easy to design things for a size 0 or size 2--there is no art there and you don't have to pay experienced seamstresses to create garments. No draping, no darts, no tailoring at all, no craft; you just make a schmatte out of cheap stretch jersey, cut out some unflattering arm holes, and maybe throw a few beads on it. Designing for real women's bodies is much more time-intensive, challenging and, yes, expensive.
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gladys_kravitz
06/14/09

@BookishLookish: You're right about it taking much more skill and not everyone can do it. The freak outs on Project Runway in the real woman challenges are legendary.
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Calraigh
06/14/09

@BookishLookish: Absolutely. When faced with the prospect of designing a piece of clothing for a woman with a markedly different ratio between her waist, her hips and her breasts, most high-end designers would just have an attack of the vapours and wake up screaming '' The Horror!THE HORROR!! ''for the the rest of their lives. When you think about it, they're not actually clothes designers, they're more like incredibly commercial '' artists '' who work primarily with fabric. And human beings have to find some way (by being fleshless) to fit into these works of ''art''.

It just so happens that the rest of the human race needs actual clothes.

It's pretty incredible that Schulman has thrown down. I just wonder will anyone else follow suit?
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BookishLookish
06/14/09

@Calraigh: You're right, fashion is fine blend of art and commerce. Too bad so many houses have forgotten they are designing for actual humans.

I was a fit model in Italy in the early 80s. I arrived in Milan a largish 6, after a few months I was an 8 (anyone who has ever tasted the food in Italy knows why!), but it was fine--back in those days, women, and therefore models, were allowed to have curvy figures. One of the design assistants used to call me "the Cello," which he definitely meant as an insult. He would carry on about how impossible it was to drape fabric, etc. One day a seamstress came to my defense. She was mid-sixties, very old-school, she wore black every day, a big cross, a classic Italian widow. "You leave the American girl alone!" she shouted. "She is beautiful! You think she's so big, watch out she doesn't knock you on your fennel-scented ass!" That's a translation of course, sounds much nicer in Italian.
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htotheomo
06/14/09

@BookishLookish: No, I plan on calling someone a fennel-scented ass today.
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BookishLookish
06/14/09

@htotheomo: I like the new avatar. Viva la amazona!
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MsMuffinMcGuffin
06/14/09

@BookishLookish: LOVE your story!!! Is it ok if I steal the line? I will give you full credit of course.
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BookishLookish
06/14/09

@MsMuffinMcGuffin: Steal away, doll!
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1.1.1.
06/14/09

@BookishLookish:

That would be true if all clothes were made out of cheap stretch jersey.

It's true that a beautiful young girl will make anything look good -- that's why they send them down the runway. But with better clothes, significant craft is involved.
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BookishLookish
06/14/09

@1.1.1.: Wow, it's like you're reading my mind.
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1.1.1.
06/14/09

@BookishLookish:

Actually, I was trying to say diplomatically that I don't think you know much about fashion design or clothing construction.
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BookishLookish
06/14/09

@1.1.1.: Yes, very diplomatic! You do know what a fit model does, don't you? Don't answer that, I've got a plane to catch and I'm not interested in debating what you know and what I know about clothing construction. I will bow to your superior knowledge on this topic.
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Calraigh
06/14/09

@BookishLookish: Wowza. I did some modelling about a decade ( a freaking decade ago ) and my sister is doing some now to make a few bucks through university, as I did and the difference in entry-level requirements now are...unbelievable. My test shots from '99/00 wouldn't get me a job marketing cheese, let alone couture. My sis is closer to a 0 than I ever was, she's much taller and she's genetically that rangy, runner-bean, ''modelly'' build that I got away with for a while before I said fuck it, show me the Guinness, but even she gets serious grief now. And she's only doing it part fucking time. She says quite apart from what the sample sizes have become, the actual photographers only seem to book models who have the whole lollipop beheaded/alien/big-eyed/bug-eyed thing going on. And apparently you get paid more if you allow them to throw food/liquid on you, which is de rigeur for a lot of editorial shoots.

Fashion. It's a fucking palaver.
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VoxPopuli
06/14/09

@BookishLookish: Oh, I love that story.

@Calraigh: Wow, between you and Bookish, you're upping the commenters' collective attractiveness factor.
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krismry
06/14/09

@BookishLookish:Best story of the week, best comment of the day!
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Mama Penguino
06/14/09

@VoxPopuli: No shit. It's making me feel like Queen Frumpus for my "bag of stuff" comment, above!
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Dot
06/15/09

@Calraigh: Saliromania, the fetish of the moment.
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VoxPopuli
06/15/09

@Mama Penguino: Nah, I liked your comment too. I have the same theory, but since I'm still looking for a Mr. Vox I guess I have to care a bit. Then once he drives the bag of bones off the lot, I'm going to pop out of the Spanx like a roll of Pillsbury cinnamon buns, mixed metaphors and all. Huzzah!
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Calraigh
06/15/09

@Dot: Aha!

Still, doesn't completely explain this.

It makes me feel..unusual in my downstairs place.
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Un Chien Andalou
06/14/09

In reply to British Vogue Editor's Lame PR Coup: No More Size Zeros!
How incredibly irresponsible to use anything but anorexic models during a recession. Make do with less.
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Hirondelle
06/14/09

In reply to British Vogue Editor's Lame PR Coup: No More Size Zeros!
Hah, I'm so sure.

AS: Karl, we've got to talk.

KL: I dream of transparent fur.

AS: We have to "reinvent" ourselves because that's what fashion people do.

KL: (dons kimono)

AS: I think we should complain about designers making doll-sized clothes.

KL: I have an assistant to manage my iPods. He is a doll. (gloveslaps assistant)

AS: It will be a hard sell, because, y'know, it's the recession and nobody will care about fashion anymore, which is why we're all out of business and everybody thinks Dior is the French infinitive for "to die".

KL: (stares imperturbably through sunglasses)

AS: Well, I'M going to at least.

KL: (stares imperturbably through sunglasses)
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raincoaster
06/14/09

@Hirondelle: You're Fake Karl, aren't you?

[fakekarl.blogspot.com]
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Private Hangnail
06/14/09

In reply to British Vogue Editor's Lame PR Coup: No More Size Zeros!
I try to not take it personally when producers of goods and the agents they use to sell them aren't marketing specifically to me. I mean, is John Deere being anti-urban because they don't manufacture a tractor that can fit in my apartment?
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Oxycontin Merry-go-round
06/13/09

In reply to British Vogue Editor's Lame PR Coup: No More Size Zeros!
Maybe I'm just being a contrarian, but I feel fashion models are still a bit too fat. Put some clothes on this, send it down a runway, and then we're talking sexy:

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Eric Merrill
06/14/09

@Oxycontin Merry-go-round: mmh! diggin' the bow-legged stance and apathetic shoulder posturing.
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raincoaster
06/14/09

@Eric Merrill: It's Agyness!
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quatrevingtquatre
06/14/09

@Oxycontin Merry-go-round:
S/he is a little bit too smiley, too commercial.
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krismry
06/14/09

@thatonegirlsays: If it is female, then it is still too fat. Send boys down the runway in the clothes and they can, sure bet, be any size they damn well want to be.
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Rumpelstilskin
06/13/09

In reply to British Vogue Editor's Lame PR Coup: No More Size Zeros!
Well, shall we see what happens, people?
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Mama Penguino
06/13/09

In reply to British Vogue Editor's Lame PR Coup: No More Size Zeros!
People, we're all just bags of bones, blood and organs. Sometimes it astonishes me how much people care about their shells.
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Btwbfdimho
06/14/09

@Mama Penguino: You don't care about shells? Have you ever heard about something called lobster bisque?

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Mama Penguino
06/14/09

@Btwbfdimho: Are you kidding? I only learned about scrod during a trip to Boston two years ago. I am landlocked.
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