October 16, 2006
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Skinny Models
Models who are too skinny have been a great subject of debate here recently. At the same time “plus-size” models have gained ground. The thinking is that regular people will be better able to see how outfits would fit on themselves with models that are closer to their size.
I think that looking at “plus-size” models appeal to some because they feel they may look better in comparison.
Here is a few photos of “plus-size” models from an article on SFgate.com:
I can see why a business would want to use attractive models with good bodies to sell their product. I think a more attractive model brings attention to the outfit.
Do you think the average size person is more likely to purchase something if the model is closer to their size?
Comments (101)
Well, I’m about the same shape as a model, so I’ve no idea really.
Yes and No.
Young people will want to look like the skinny models. Older people will want to envision what the product would “really” look like on them.
But I do think the pictures you put up are much more attractive than the average skinny-arsed picture. More meat!
no idea..
“Young people will want to look like the skinny models.”
I think that’s only because we tell them that that’s what they want. What if there were no more skinny models? Would the next generation have a different image of beauty in their heads?
guess it depends on the person.
Most pictures of models intrigue me because they look so unnatural, but I don’t think they influence me to buy the clothes they are wearing.
I’d be more likely to consider a new look if I could see what someone who is shaped like me looks like in it…..
but that’s me…. (and I’m not shaped like a model….)
I don’t know if they would influence me to buy anything, since the clothes they are modeling are probably waaaayy out of my price range. I do, however, appreciate “beefier” models since I am not a size negative 5 like the “regular” models are. These women are gorgeous, and the fact that they are considered “plus-sized” makes me ill. Wow, I used a lot of “quotes” in this comment.
There are two reasons why I don’t buy my clothes based on what models where…i’m too broke and i’m too fat.
Ugh. How sad that those two girls are considered “plus size”.
However, I would say that if you are using a model to sell your clothing (thus the reason for a model, correct?), then it would be best to use models that look like your potential customers. By using anorexic models, I feel that most companies indicate that they do not want people my size wearing their clothing. That’s okay with me. There are lots of companies that are willing to take my money. And they get it hand over fist.
I never buy anything because of how it looks on the model. It never works out to look that way in real life. And I’ve come to terms with the fact that no clothing is going to make me look like the model in the picture.
ryc: yeah, I know. You’d think we’d be smarter than that. “learn from your mistakes” why doesn’t that apply to us??
I don’t know that I’ve ever bought any clothing due to a model’s influence, then again, I’m a baggy son of a bitch when it comes to clothes, and models usually show skin and curves.
Yeah, I think they’re more likely to say to themselves, “I can pull that off” and purchase the prodcut. I don’t have a problem seeing models of all sizes though… skinny , plus size… it doesn’t bother me or influence me much either way because my body is somewhere inbetween.
those are plus size?!? they look..regular…to me..
but i think i would be more likely to buy sumthing if the model was close to my size
I have never bought anything based on the model that shows it. What I think is interesting is that the fashion industry considers size 14 to be plus sized, even though the average American woman is that size. I don’t think those women look plus sized at all. That is why young girls have such a distorted body image. What is really healthy and normal is portryed by the media as plus sized! I think the super skinny models today are terrible looking. I don’t know of any man who really wants a woman that skinny.
I don’t really pay any attention to the models, but protruding ribs don’t encourage me to buy anything.
My lady is a big woman, so we get plus-sized catalogs delivered to the house. I’ve leafed through a few of them and they all (the ones we get, anyway) feature average-sized models. The sizes you can order from the catalog are for big women but the clothes on the models are much smaller.
I asked, “Why don’t they feature big women in these catalogs?”
My lady replied, “They used to, but the clothes didn’t sell.”
“Don’t big women want to see a woman their size so they’ll get a better idea of what they’ll look like in the clothes?”
“No,” she retorted, “Big women want to think that they’ll look like the average-sized woman in the picture if they wear those clothes.”
That wasn’t an angry retort, mind you; it was more “matter of fact”.
Anyway, to answer your question: I think people tend to purphase the clothes they see “cool” people wearing, and not necessarily models. I think most people realize that clothes can’t make you thinner or prettier, but some can be fooled into thinking that certain clothes can make you cool.
Maybe, but where are the “middle models”? You know… not stick thin, but not “plus size”…
I buy clothes that *I* like and that is that. The clothes the plus sized models are wearing wouldn’t be flattering on me because I have a small chest….so I think I’d go more with what a normal model was wearing. However these girls you have pictured don’t really look that “plus size” to me. Yes, they are heavier than the traditional stick thin model, but I wouldn’t consider them to be fat.
Those are PLUS SIZE models? Wow!
Well, I don’t ever purchase clothing depending on how it looks on a model. I purchase what I like because I like it and it looks and most of all feels lovely and comfy on me. I have to try my clothes on from the hanger to see about all those things.
But, when I see a model that weighs under a 100 pounds and her head looks oversized for her body (because she is under weight) I don’t even notice the clothes, I think about how skinny she is and how sad that she thinks that is acceptable.
Yes definitely. I know if it fits a tall model then its not going to fit me. So I just avoid the shop.
I’m no expert on fashion, models and modelling but i believe people should start focusing on being dressed in clothing styles that would both fit their personality and figure. You can’t go wrong with that. My 2 cents.
Why encourage fat people?
I don’t know. I just get really annoyed when I see a cute article of clothing on a mannequin in a store, and then I get the item in my size, and it looks bad on me. They always put a 0 or a 2 on display, and some clothes only look good on skinny people. By the time I get a 10 or a 12, I don’t look so good in it. And the styles right now seem to benefit only the tall and skinny, not the people with average height and curves.
Size 12 is now considered plus-size.
I’m fat, curvy, and have huge boobs. Why would I want to wear something that a skinny, boy-bodied, mosquito-bite breasted woman would wear? Bring on the fat models! And not just a size 12. Give me a size 24 anyday.
It is a sad comment on our society when those two women are considered “Plus size”
I like clothes that are on average women. Clothes that fit a really skinny model don’t look the same on a 47-year old woman who has given birth to three children. Life changes your body through age, illness, and childbirth. So, if she’s an average person the average woman knows that there’s a chance it will fit and feel good to wear. Make sense? Does to me.
And now that I see the pictures, these are beautiful women–no matter what their size.
I cannot stand it when a girl is skinny like a model. I find it to be incredibly unnatractive. I’m not saying i like obese people, but i like them to have some mass to them. Models terrify me, because i’m afraid i might puncture my lung with their bony body.
I agree with Damien_Vryce. They aren’t plus size at all!
Yes-
Thin models totally turn my head and want to buy those clothes and make me want to loose more weight…
In fact I have been making quite an effort to shed my weight. I have about 20 more pounds to go according to my trainer. That would made me thin but not underweight according to the BMI index. For me to be underweight- I need to weight less than 111 lbs. To many that is THIN!!! To me… well…
As an artist- personally the look of fabric “Drapping” on the body has a Greater appeal to me than clothes that are tight and fitted.
XoxoxoX
It’s sad that those models you pictured above are considered “plus size.” I’d bet anyone anything that if those models went to a doctor and got their height and weight measured that they’d find out that they are perfectly healthy for their height and weight and should not be considered “plus size.” Yet, the modeling industry considers any model over a size 14 here in America as a plus sized model, yet the average size for a high fashion model is a size 0-4!!! It’s an impossible situation!!! I’m loving people like Queen Latifa, MoNique, and others like them who are F.A.T. Fabulous And Thick!!!! I myself am F.A.T. and know I look damn sexy!
THose are supposed to be plus sized models? Good grief!
I’m with Ren. I’m about the same size as a model (without the height, heh), so it doesn’t make much difference to me. I am glad that plus-size modeling has been more up and coming lately, I feel like it’s giving a more realistic twist to the modeling industry. Personally I can’t stand a skin-and-bones anorexic looking girl — model or no — so I like the plus size girls coming out and making some tracks.
I would (if I had the money to buy anything advertised on a model). Something that looks good on a 100 lb. chick will not look the same on me. I love finding girls my build in cute clothes to see what I should be wearing.
i think so..that way people don’t think that when they put it on it’ll make them look fat…
i think it’s best to have normal looking people wearing their clothing because then they’d see exactly how their clothes fit on people. it doesn’t look the same on skinny mini models as it does on normal people. they don’t fall the same way.
mom says yes dad says no I say i have no clue
xX-Nicole-Xx
Curiously, skinny models is almost entirely a result of female attitiudes: in experiment after experiment men as a whole, given a choice between different body types, men will always choose women with some roundness, while women will pick, as the body type they think men will like, annorexic looking women.
Sexism is largely passed from woman to woman, mother to child.
those pictures are not of “plus sized” models. I know that is what they are called… but they still look skinny compared to me… it would help to see models that are actually “plus sized”.. not a size 12.
Yeah, I think so.
Yes, as it’s going to be more likely to be made for her body. Many things made for a size 0 body shape are not going to be flattering on a size 6 or 12.
The one weird thing is, though that “plus size” begins at, like, size 6. Which is me. There’s something wierd about having the avergae be considered “plus sized.”
I think this pictures are deceiving. These are “normal-sized” women. There are the “anorexic-size” that we currently have most times. Then they are these women considered plus size, but are healthy and normal women. Then there is over weight.
Hi Dan,
I tend to be thin so thin models don’t annoy me….Plus size models have a place in fashion too….Everyone needs to just get along and realize that people come in all shapes and sizes.
The men in my life have always loved my small bones and small frame…..
My son love girls with “junk in the trunk”…..and says bones are for dogs…..so go figure…..
Candy
YES- I hate going in to a store where there are these timy models on posters in the window n when ya go in the biggest size is an 8- I have always fallin in the cracks of the stores, Im Not in the reg store at a size 13- or 16 Im in the plus size store but then Im the smallest size and they dont have many of my size there either…
I think it makes the purchase more realistic.
It very much depends on the person.
yes, and fyi to the fat people comment starting at size 10 is now considered plus size and most of your average “healthy” women fall into that size range and for some it is too small, for instance when I was a size 10 I was under weight according to the bmi… sooo
but I’ve always found that looking at models that where closer to my size made me want to get the clothes on display especialy in reguards to bust size… most thinner models don’t have a big bust which I’ve always had (36 D at size 10) so it’s nice to see a fuller chest fill out a top to know that when I try it on it will actually fit…
and seriously do you really think those girls are “fat”… they look very sexy to me…
I would like to see it on someone closer to my size. I would buy more (if thats possible). It’s like someone else said, the styles now require you to be tall and skinny.
Dude, the lady in the bottom picture is HOT.
I damn sure would be. Uh…where are the plus sized models, honey? Those women aren’t plus suzed.
Yes, I think they would.
I won’t buy clothing based on models. I’m too poor to dress like that.
-Guru on the Hill
What is the “average size person”?
Anyway, I think it makes sense that people would be more likely to by an article of clothing if it is being modeled attractively by a model their size. I think this would be especially true with women. Men’s fashions seem to be more accomodating to various sizes.
considering i am the size of a skinny model, i like seeing clothes on skinny models
. but seeing them on average sized models is good.
most of the time, i still have to try clothes on. you might see something cool on a skinny model, but that doesn’t mean that’s how it actually fits. a lot of clothes in america don’t fit my body shape (long and lean).
yes. i watch the fashion stuff, and my immediate thoughts are “if i could see how that would look on me, i would be more inclined to pay the money to buy it.
I am not an average size but I like to see all size models,just like people.No matter what, the clothing never look the same on someone else
I can’t afford to buy from the mall, and anything modeled I would have to pay for in installments. I’d rather just be glad with the clothes I get, not to mention they last awhile and if they get ruined, you’re not out more than $20.00. I can’t say for all average people, but a majority of them may not care.
they may not be more likely to buy it, but they’d be a little less annoyed at the fact that a skinny person was modeling the clothes made for a plus-sized person.
ehh… idk
Yeah, I’d say so
People will buy regardless of the model. Most models are smaller than the clothes that are out there anyway, and clothes are still being bought all the time. People aren’t going to go around naked just because they don’t see the clothes on a model they can relate to.
No. Clothes look best on stick-thin women and that’s why we have models in the first place, so that the clothes will look like they are still on a hanger and people buy the clothes.
since ”plus size model” = average size common person (looks like), then yes, I think they would.
i dunno to me id rather see it on a skinny model but not overly skinny and not overlly fat
Depending on the person, some were buy if they thought the clothes look good. Others would buy only caring about what other people would think.
they look really nice to me.
A little
I think so
I wouldn’t buy those clothes on those models, mainly because I would have no idea what they would look like on me. Seeing skinny models doesn’t bother me because I’m very thin as well. Something that would fit the women in the above pictures wouldn’t fit me as well. I have a smaller frame than they do, and much smaller tits.
Definatly! I mean, most clothes fit really tiny, so even most average-sized people can’t wear normal nice clothes!
Why encourage fat people?
Posted 10/16/2006 at 9:02 AM by deflate
Hahahaha!
That’s so MEAN!
I got on the scale Sunday. I’m 5’11″. I’m down to 143 pounds.
I’m going to join some “thin” blogrings and troll for comments by young girls who have no purpose in life to come and tell me how pretty I am, and to be strong.
It is such a struggle, against ourselves and the world to be perfect, and obviously nothing else matters, but being thin, and being strong in the face of the incrudulousness of the “fat people”
Who hate us thin beautiful strugglers. You know how I got so my ribs stick out and my body looks emaciated?
Starved myself and the occassional foray into drugs. Plain and simple! I don’t know what this intake shit is all about, seriously, there are easier ways, plus you never get hungry on drugs!
I hope I can make it to Thanksgiving without collapsing and ending up in the hospital, because a feeding tube would ruin my quest to be perfect, and I need to be strong…
I can’t really say that I ever really notice the models. I don’t really think “OMG she looks good in those clothes, so I will too!”
Not really. If I like it, I could care less if the model is a size 2 or 22.
if advertising didn’t work, corporations wouldn’t dump millions of dollars into it. i laugh at these chumps who say that they are not influenced by advertising. they are the best kind. influenced without knowing they are being influenced. charming.
i think an honest evaluation of how clothes will really fit is a step in the right direction. as far as adriene’s comment… yes, if models were to meat up in this generation, meatier girls would be more acceptable….
look at the latin industry. their models are not bony like in the caucasian market. and in times past, chunkier/whitewashed girls were held as attractive b/c the poor were skinny and manually labored in the sun and were tanned by it. more meat and light skin was a sign of affluence.
yeah i guess so.
Maybe. It wouldn’t hurt to have more different models, let’s put it like that.
Have no idea. Why do you ask?
I think they should do a little of both.
What about a few naturally skinny models, a few average sized models, and some plus size models as well?
Yes. People don’t like to own up to the fact that they are fat. They want fat to be beautiful. Good luck. Other countries think we are disgusting. I tend to agree.
i don’t ever buy clothes based on what they look like on models. it’s unrealistic to look at clothes on a model and expect them to look exactly the same on real people. but i think plus size models look better than super skinny models anyways.
Not really.
[ariana]
absolutely
Yes. Most younger people seem to prefer skinny models. I do not.
I would. And just for the record, BelinaRising, I’m 13, and I think I would much rather look like the models in those pictures rather than those disgustingly skinny ones.
-KrIsTiN-
I like seeing women that have something to them as models for more reasons than a better estimate of how it will look on me. I *do* like having an idea though.
there is no way i would buy certain types of clothes or even try them on since they are only shown on skinny models > i learned that the hard way in high school. the new skinny black pants can go scratch since i will never try them on let alone pay $48 for the priviledge.
even when i was a teen i would be more likely to buy something if i saw it on a person that was my size.
also, did you notice that these plus-sized models in your pics are really beautiful? regardless of body type? and that they don’t look particularly “plus-sized”? the average woman in our country is a size 14, and most plus-sized models are 12s, so is that really representative anyway?
I guess that that’s true because they can see how it fits on someone clost to their size or something.
I also think that it matter WHO’s wearing whatever it is the company’s trying to sell; example: if I’s trying to sell some really good looking, fitting, clothes and the model I use for selling the items isn’t “popular”, who’s gonna care what she’s wearing? If the person next to me selling something cheap and they use someone famous like Jessica Simpson, for example, then whose not going to buy it?
That’s not plus size. That’s…an average person right there.
O.O
its funny how peoples perception of size has changed over the years. the people are getting fatter and fatter and they just keep on making the clothes bigger but not changing the sizes so these fatties could feel better about their every growing gargatuan self.
PS. the 2nd model is thick and the first one is just plain fat. not obese. just fat. because you know theres levels of fucking fatness.
Sadly not! Clothes always look the best on those coat hanger models!
I think there are a lot of really haute couture items that fashion designers build around skinny models, that would not look as good on someone with curves, etc. That is how they draw customers to buy their off the rack stuff.
What’s wrong with curves? Is being stick thin really THAT attractive? Being fat isn’t healthy either, but being “average” weight is very attractive.
definately. I wouldn’t buy something if the model was skinnier than me
I think it would because, if I see something that’s on a model that is like, 5 times skinnier than me, I know that the outfit she’s wearing may not look as good on me because it will be 5 sizes bigger….and I hate that.
Yes actually. But…it’s upsetting that these women are considered “plus-size”.
Definitely.
“Plus sized models have…g a i n e d g r o u n d…” funny….. I would rather see regular sized models…not skinny little things
I think both of those women are attractive. And they aren’t obese. They certainly don’t look unhealthy.
I think that they should put healthy girls as the models. Our society should be encouraging health, not either extreme!