A new Facebook group, Busts4Justice, has been hitting the papers recently calling on lingerie retailers to stop adding to the cost of bras above the high street standard (A to C/D) size.
It has long been a mystery to me why high street shops carry on with limiting their stock to such small sizes when the average woman, if correctly measured, would apparently wear a 34E. On the one hand we are told to get measured and, usually, once measured, we are told we are some ridiculously large cup size - and on the other hand, the only bras available on the high street are in teensy sizes. Surely the stores would be raking it in if they started selling bras that fit the average woman?
Thursday, 24 July 2008
Tuesday, 1 July 2008
Putting an end to ASBOs for fat
The problem with controlling your size and shape in one area of your body is that invariably the 'fall-out' makes itself noticed somewhere else. It's a bit like giving fat an ASBO - it just turns up elsewhere causing the same problems.
This has long been a problem with lipo, and also with bras - by squeezing the chest into a great cleavage, you end up with bulges around the bra straps on your back. OK, so it's not a major world problem, but it's enough of an issue for bra manufacturers to invent a back-fat-less bra, the Bra-llelujah. (Which is one of most unattractive but practical-looking bras I have ever seen). The jokily religious connotation of the name is not all that inappropriate - women are clearly expected to worship this ingenious garment.
Was there any time in history, I wonder, when a woman's back fat was considered sexy, when the sight of a roll of flesh oozing out of the top of a corset-back was seen as sensual and beautiful?
An article from the Women's Home Companion in 1912 makes it clear this was not the case a century ago: 'Let me tell you that the fat woman looks much better in a corset an inch or so too large for her, where her fat can sink down into it, rather than in a corset two or three inches too small which presses her fat up and out until it appears in many unsightly bulges and bumps....The woman who has perfect corset sense is she who wears a corset right in size, right in shape, and so perfectly fitted that the corset and figure seem one.'
But it's not just 'fat' women who have this issue - any woman not very slim who wears a tight corset or bra is going to end up with back fat.
This has long been a problem with lipo, and also with bras - by squeezing the chest into a great cleavage, you end up with bulges around the bra straps on your back. OK, so it's not a major world problem, but it's enough of an issue for bra manufacturers to invent a back-fat-less bra, the Bra-llelujah. (Which is one of most unattractive but practical-looking bras I have ever seen). The jokily religious connotation of the name is not all that inappropriate - women are clearly expected to worship this ingenious garment.
Was there any time in history, I wonder, when a woman's back fat was considered sexy, when the sight of a roll of flesh oozing out of the top of a corset-back was seen as sensual and beautiful?
An article from the Women's Home Companion in 1912 makes it clear this was not the case a century ago: 'Let me tell you that the fat woman looks much better in a corset an inch or so too large for her, where her fat can sink down into it, rather than in a corset two or three inches too small which presses her fat up and out until it appears in many unsightly bulges and bumps....The woman who has perfect corset sense is she who wears a corset right in size, right in shape, and so perfectly fitted that the corset and figure seem one.'
But it's not just 'fat' women who have this issue - any woman not very slim who wears a tight corset or bra is going to end up with back fat.
Monday, 23 June 2008
Can you change your genetic size?
I was intrigued to read yesterday in the Observer of a machine called the Hybrid Body Reformer invented by personal trainer to the stars Tracy Anderson. The article mentions Anderson's '10-year quest for a method that would convert 'any person from any genetic structure into this teeny-tiny dancer body.''
What she came up with was a workout machine that crosses pilates with aerobics - you use pulleys to do aerobic dance movements that encourage the body to exercise muscles which are weak - for instance, a pear shaped woman may have weak quads, and the machine will focus on tightening them up. Instead of doing repetitions with weights, she apparantly gets clients like Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow to rotate their weights to hit the muscles afresh from different angles.
She told the Daily Mail last year: 'Instead of over-using the major muscles, I focus on the muscles around them. When the accessory muscles are properly developed, they pull in the larger ones, creating a tinier body structure. In this way you can reshape your body.'
Interesting, her repeated use of the word 'tiny'. There is, it seems, no escape anymore from the need to be 'tiny'. It's a hot word, a word that makes women - including me - sit up and notice. Your genetic inheritance, your natural body size, is supposed to be modified in today's world, whether by cosmetic surgery, starvation diets or workouts. Presumably the change brought about by this machine is temporary and letting the exercise go would result in falling back into your old, natural size - so you need to do constant upkeep to stay this tiny.
I honestly don't see what is so attractive about being a very small size unless it is someone's natural size, in which case you can almost always tell. To me it is obvious when somebody is at a lower weight than is natural for them, as much as it is obvious when someone is plump. They usually look rather strained and hollow-cheeked. Why does Hollywood think this look is good? In Bollywood, the stars are truly gorgeous by comparison - lusciously and sexily curvy, neither skinny nor plump but just natural-looking. They have breasts and bottoms and hips, unlike, to name a few, Keira Knightly or Paris Hilton. What is it about the west that has made tininess so essential? Is it our wealth, the amount of food we have on offer, that makes thinness the ultimate moral discipline, just as in the 19th century, not wearing a corset was seen as morally and sexually 'loose'?
What she came up with was a workout machine that crosses pilates with aerobics - you use pulleys to do aerobic dance movements that encourage the body to exercise muscles which are weak - for instance, a pear shaped woman may have weak quads, and the machine will focus on tightening them up. Instead of doing repetitions with weights, she apparantly gets clients like Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow to rotate their weights to hit the muscles afresh from different angles.
She told the Daily Mail last year: 'Instead of over-using the major muscles, I focus on the muscles around them. When the accessory muscles are properly developed, they pull in the larger ones, creating a tinier body structure. In this way you can reshape your body.'
Interesting, her repeated use of the word 'tiny'. There is, it seems, no escape anymore from the need to be 'tiny'. It's a hot word, a word that makes women - including me - sit up and notice. Your genetic inheritance, your natural body size, is supposed to be modified in today's world, whether by cosmetic surgery, starvation diets or workouts. Presumably the change brought about by this machine is temporary and letting the exercise go would result in falling back into your old, natural size - so you need to do constant upkeep to stay this tiny.
I honestly don't see what is so attractive about being a very small size unless it is someone's natural size, in which case you can almost always tell. To me it is obvious when somebody is at a lower weight than is natural for them, as much as it is obvious when someone is plump. They usually look rather strained and hollow-cheeked. Why does Hollywood think this look is good? In Bollywood, the stars are truly gorgeous by comparison - lusciously and sexily curvy, neither skinny nor plump but just natural-looking. They have breasts and bottoms and hips, unlike, to name a few, Keira Knightly or Paris Hilton. What is it about the west that has made tininess so essential? Is it our wealth, the amount of food we have on offer, that makes thinness the ultimate moral discipline, just as in the 19th century, not wearing a corset was seen as morally and sexually 'loose'?
Tuesday, 17 June 2008
Monday, 9 June 2008
Clothes that make you thin
'The wardrobe diet' was the headline of a first-person piece this Sunday in the Style section of the Sunday Times. The writer, Francesca Gavin, explains how the fashion of recent years for smocks and voluminous draped clothing allowed her to gain weight unnoticed. She then lost the weight by forcing herself into tight tailored outfits which simply refuse to let the stomach expand a centimetre. The piece is illustrated by a box on how to 'dress yourself thin' with waist-girdling belts and tight dresses and skirts.
'If I literally restricted my clothes...my flesh would inch off,' she writes. 'At first it was darned uncomfortable. Eating is hard if your stomach is bound by fabric...I kept in mind Joan Collins's mantra about a flat stomach - if you hold it in at all times, it will stay there.'
Of course in centuries gone by, women submitted to tight, boned clothing in exactly this way, knowing the very act of wearing it regularly would 'train' the figure to be smaller.
Today, we are free to dress baggily in the morning, knowing we have a big lunch ahead. We rely on our clothes getting tight to tell us when we are expanding. It can go too far. Many women feel fat and dress in clothes that are too loose, not realising that body-skimming clothes would actually show off their figures to their advantage.
For the sake of being thin, is it worth being perpetually in discomfort and never able to slob out on the sofa in sweatpants and baggy t-shirts?
'If I literally restricted my clothes...my flesh would inch off,' she writes. 'At first it was darned uncomfortable. Eating is hard if your stomach is bound by fabric...I kept in mind Joan Collins's mantra about a flat stomach - if you hold it in at all times, it will stay there.'
Of course in centuries gone by, women submitted to tight, boned clothing in exactly this way, knowing the very act of wearing it regularly would 'train' the figure to be smaller.
Today, we are free to dress baggily in the morning, knowing we have a big lunch ahead. We rely on our clothes getting tight to tell us when we are expanding. It can go too far. Many women feel fat and dress in clothes that are too loose, not realising that body-skimming clothes would actually show off their figures to their advantage.
For the sake of being thin, is it worth being perpetually in discomfort and never able to slob out on the sofa in sweatpants and baggy t-shirts?
Tuesday, 3 June 2008
Back to the 1970s?
On last night's Tonight, a programme about a government plan to bribe overweight people in the UK to lose weight, it was stated that in Britain, our caloric intake has actually declined since the 1970s. Yet as we all know, British people in the 70s were much thinner than they are today. The collective weight gain, then, is more because of the lack of an active lifestyle than because of what or how much we are eating.
If this is true, it's extraordinary that so many people are spending their lives engaged in dietary battles, when all they need to do is become more active. I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking that if faced with a choice between dieting and exercising, most of us would go for exercising.
It's curious, too, how the way we exercise today makes our bodies bigger and stronger rather than the lithe, slender sizes of women in the 70s and before.
My mother recently recalled how in the 1950s, when she was a teenager, women simply did not 'work out' as we do today. The odd woman with muscles, who did a lot of sports, was considered rather freakish. Presumably, though, women were still far more active than today because of walking everywhere, not watching TV for hours most evenings, and not sitting all day at computers. Children of the 70s, like me, ran around and played outside. Today, it seems, they are all indoors, playing computer games and watching DVDs.
Today, we have segmented exercise from the rest of our lives. Like so many others, I work at a computer all day, then go to the gym for an hour a few evenings per week. Many of the most popular classes at my gym involve weight lifting combined with aerobics - there's Body Pump, Circuits, Boxercise, Total Body Conditioning. Or we use the machines - running on the treadmill, rowing, skiing, then lifting weights - we are told that to build muscle is good because it burns fat and raises the metabolism. Women today are muscular - the bulging biceps these classes build are considered sexy, a sign of being fit and toned.
And yet we eat less than in the 70s. In a way, this isn't so surprising when you compare the roast meat and two veg at lunchtimes, teatimes and elevenses and high teas and trifles and creamy sauces we enjoyed in the 70s with the ready meals of today. Although ready meals are typically high in calories and fat compared to homemade food, they are not nutritious or filling and the calories per portion size are usually around 4-500, which is quite a small meal. So there you have it - we are guiltily consuming unsatisfying diet ready meals with quite low calorie counts, doing our workouts, and developing big, muscular bodies, bigger than women's bodies have ever been in this country before. The solution then, the way to get back the pre-1980s bodies we all prefer, is perhaps to sit less, walk more, put the weights down, and eat home-cooked, nourishing meals.
If this is true, it's extraordinary that so many people are spending their lives engaged in dietary battles, when all they need to do is become more active. I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking that if faced with a choice between dieting and exercising, most of us would go for exercising.
It's curious, too, how the way we exercise today makes our bodies bigger and stronger rather than the lithe, slender sizes of women in the 70s and before.
My mother recently recalled how in the 1950s, when she was a teenager, women simply did not 'work out' as we do today. The odd woman with muscles, who did a lot of sports, was considered rather freakish. Presumably, though, women were still far more active than today because of walking everywhere, not watching TV for hours most evenings, and not sitting all day at computers. Children of the 70s, like me, ran around and played outside. Today, it seems, they are all indoors, playing computer games and watching DVDs.
Today, we have segmented exercise from the rest of our lives. Like so many others, I work at a computer all day, then go to the gym for an hour a few evenings per week. Many of the most popular classes at my gym involve weight lifting combined with aerobics - there's Body Pump, Circuits, Boxercise, Total Body Conditioning. Or we use the machines - running on the treadmill, rowing, skiing, then lifting weights - we are told that to build muscle is good because it burns fat and raises the metabolism. Women today are muscular - the bulging biceps these classes build are considered sexy, a sign of being fit and toned.
And yet we eat less than in the 70s. In a way, this isn't so surprising when you compare the roast meat and two veg at lunchtimes, teatimes and elevenses and high teas and trifles and creamy sauces we enjoyed in the 70s with the ready meals of today. Although ready meals are typically high in calories and fat compared to homemade food, they are not nutritious or filling and the calories per portion size are usually around 4-500, which is quite a small meal. So there you have it - we are guiltily consuming unsatisfying diet ready meals with quite low calorie counts, doing our workouts, and developing big, muscular bodies, bigger than women's bodies have ever been in this country before. The solution then, the way to get back the pre-1980s bodies we all prefer, is perhaps to sit less, walk more, put the weights down, and eat home-cooked, nourishing meals.
Friday, 30 May 2008
The breakdown of sizing
An article from Colorado's Gazette on Sunday makes the point that modern sizes are around half what they were 50 years ago. Marilyn Monroe is always being held up today as an inspiration for curvy women of today as a size 16, as a mark of a bygone age in which women's roundness was considered sexy. Yet according to this article, and to many other sources too, the 1950s size 16 is today's size 6-8. Which makes Marilyn pretty skinny. We have got much bigger - curves clearly weren't what they are today back in the 50s.
The article also raises the point that women are now so aware of vanity sizing and the differences between the same size between brands that they no longer expect to be any one size. The average woman may, I would guess, have clothes spanning two or three sizes in regular circulation in her wardrobe (my own wardrobe ranges from 10 at the smaller end to 14 at the larger end), plus even bigger and smaller clothes put away which she plans to wear when she gets thin, or becomes pregnant (no comment...). And I think it's fair to say we do enjoy the fact we can fit into different sizes depending on where we shop.
When sizes have become so utterly meaningless, it makes me wonder for how long we will even attempt to classify ourselves as any one size. Could shops start selling clothes as 'size 10-14' or by actual inch/cm measurements (as is suggested to standardise sizing in a current European proposal)?
I don't think women will like knowing -let alone comparing - what exactly they measure in inches, or, on the other hand, the vagueness of being a '10-14'. It seems to suit us much better psychologically to fed our vanity by saying we are the lowest size we can get into - a 10-12 for instance - and buying some garments of that size and others a size larger.
The article also raises the point that women are now so aware of vanity sizing and the differences between the same size between brands that they no longer expect to be any one size. The average woman may, I would guess, have clothes spanning two or three sizes in regular circulation in her wardrobe (my own wardrobe ranges from 10 at the smaller end to 14 at the larger end), plus even bigger and smaller clothes put away which she plans to wear when she gets thin, or becomes pregnant (no comment...). And I think it's fair to say we do enjoy the fact we can fit into different sizes depending on where we shop.
When sizes have become so utterly meaningless, it makes me wonder for how long we will even attempt to classify ourselves as any one size. Could shops start selling clothes as 'size 10-14' or by actual inch/cm measurements (as is suggested to standardise sizing in a current European proposal)?
I don't think women will like knowing -let alone comparing - what exactly they measure in inches, or, on the other hand, the vagueness of being a '10-14'. It seems to suit us much better psychologically to fed our vanity by saying we are the lowest size we can get into - a 10-12 for instance - and buying some garments of that size and others a size larger.
Thursday, 15 May 2008
Will the real 34DD please stand up?
So, my mother and I had a very fruitful visit to that bastion of brassieres, the famous Rigby & Peller. One wonders exactly how the Queen gets her underwear fitted there with any dignity, since the process of having your bra size measured is hardly modest, with one or two assistants literally scooping bosoms into cups.
Anyway, we were soon reassured as to the impeccable skills of this company. The fitters were professional and knew what they were talking about. There was, crucially, no pressure to buy, which of course resulted in us spending bigtime.
I was pronounced a 34DD-E for everyday bras, which seems about right, and was remeasured as a 32D for basque wedding underwear as it needs to be tighter to pull you in under the dress. I promptly repurchased my wedding undergarments (it all sounds so Victorian, but that's weddings for you) and realised how very wrong the wedding shop had been measuring me for the same underwear as a 36C - far, far too big! The visual difference made by going for a smaller size was unbelievable. It all goes to show how vital it is to be fitted for underwear by a real professional.
Anyway, we were soon reassured as to the impeccable skills of this company. The fitters were professional and knew what they were talking about. There was, crucially, no pressure to buy, which of course resulted in us spending bigtime.
I was pronounced a 34DD-E for everyday bras, which seems about right, and was remeasured as a 32D for basque wedding underwear as it needs to be tighter to pull you in under the dress. I promptly repurchased my wedding undergarments (it all sounds so Victorian, but that's weddings for you) and realised how very wrong the wedding shop had been measuring me for the same underwear as a 36C - far, far too big! The visual difference made by going for a smaller size was unbelievable. It all goes to show how vital it is to be fitted for underwear by a real professional.
Musings of a size 10
A friend, Em, has sent me the following for posting here. What she has to say on shoes I find especially interesting.
I don't worry much about sizes and have at times deliberately bought a size too big if I prefer the way it fits, so I don't think I am susceptible to vanity sizing. e.g. sometimes I prefer tops to fit loosely or skirts to sit on my hips rather than right up at my waist. My problem is mainly that clothes are the wrong shape for me - something that fits my waist might be too tight for my chest or bottom so I'll buy a bigger size and take it to Tam for her to alter it. also being tall I sometimes have to buy bigger sizes on the high street to get an extra cm or 2 in the length (sleeves, hem etc) and again, get them taken in.
Regarding the whole size zero thing, US sizing is as inconsistent as UK - I am usually a size 4 or 6 in America and somewhere around a 10 here. However, I have a pair of size 4 jeans from A&F that I got in NY last November and there is definitely some vanity sizing going on there as well - they fit snugly but I could probably have wedged myself into a 2 if I cared about sizing, and I could quite easily drop a dress size from where I am now through hardcore diet and exercise. I would then be a size 0, at least in that shop and that style of jeans, which is clearly nonsense - I'm slim but nowhere near Victoria Beckham/Nicole Ritchie territory. I think Natalie Cassidy has probably got hold of a similar freak pair of jeans!
It's interesting and slightly sad that the current obsession with sizes has eclipsed earlier ideals of a low waist to hip ratio - a social standard that was rooted in science, as low waist:hip ratio is a marker of fertility and also of low heart disease risk. Obviously this was also stressful for women who had to struggle with corsets etc but at least the fashion was in line with what is healthy and also with what men naturally find attractive.
Bras: Rigby & Peller told me I was a 30E last summer, but only had hideous mumsy-looking things in ivory lace in that size so I didn't buy any. I did feel a bit strangled in them too as they were very tight, but bras aren't meant to be soft and comfortable, as this doesn't give enough support; if you can get more than one finger inside the band when you've got it on, it isn't tight enough. They also give a little as you wear them, like jeans. I don't think they should bite into your skin though! I find that like clothes, bra sizes vary wildly from one brand to the next.
Are you looking at shoe sizing? I know many women who take pride in having relatively small feet and mention it wherever possible - seems especially to be women who aren't otherwise of small/dainty build or feel self-conscious about their weight. Interesting correlations to Chinese foot-binding etc. Generally shoe sizing is much more consistent than clothes sizing, probably because there are fewer manufacturers and it's not such a charged issue, although I have noticed that really expensive shoes e.g. Manolo Blahnik, Jimmy Choo tend to come up slightly smaller and definitely narrower than high-street shoe brands. I tried on some Jimmy Choo knee-high boots last year and couldn't zip them over my calves! which is obviously ridiculous as my calves are if anything slimmer than average - I usually have the opposite problem with boots. still, it saved me £500.
I don't worry much about sizes and have at times deliberately bought a size too big if I prefer the way it fits, so I don't think I am susceptible to vanity sizing. e.g. sometimes I prefer tops to fit loosely or skirts to sit on my hips rather than right up at my waist. My problem is mainly that clothes are the wrong shape for me - something that fits my waist might be too tight for my chest or bottom so I'll buy a bigger size and take it to Tam for her to alter it. also being tall I sometimes have to buy bigger sizes on the high street to get an extra cm or 2 in the length (sleeves, hem etc) and again, get them taken in.
Regarding the whole size zero thing, US sizing is as inconsistent as UK - I am usually a size 4 or 6 in America and somewhere around a 10 here. However, I have a pair of size 4 jeans from A&F that I got in NY last November and there is definitely some vanity sizing going on there as well - they fit snugly but I could probably have wedged myself into a 2 if I cared about sizing, and I could quite easily drop a dress size from where I am now through hardcore diet and exercise. I would then be a size 0, at least in that shop and that style of jeans, which is clearly nonsense - I'm slim but nowhere near Victoria Beckham/Nicole Ritchie territory. I think Natalie Cassidy has probably got hold of a similar freak pair of jeans!
It's interesting and slightly sad that the current obsession with sizes has eclipsed earlier ideals of a low waist to hip ratio - a social standard that was rooted in science, as low waist:hip ratio is a marker of fertility and also of low heart disease risk. Obviously this was also stressful for women who had to struggle with corsets etc but at least the fashion was in line with what is healthy and also with what men naturally find attractive.
Bras: Rigby & Peller told me I was a 30E last summer, but only had hideous mumsy-looking things in ivory lace in that size so I didn't buy any. I did feel a bit strangled in them too as they were very tight, but bras aren't meant to be soft and comfortable, as this doesn't give enough support; if you can get more than one finger inside the band when you've got it on, it isn't tight enough. They also give a little as you wear them, like jeans. I don't think they should bite into your skin though! I find that like clothes, bra sizes vary wildly from one brand to the next.
Are you looking at shoe sizing? I know many women who take pride in having relatively small feet and mention it wherever possible - seems especially to be women who aren't otherwise of small/dainty build or feel self-conscious about their weight. Interesting correlations to Chinese foot-binding etc. Generally shoe sizing is much more consistent than clothes sizing, probably because there are fewer manufacturers and it's not such a charged issue, although I have noticed that really expensive shoes e.g. Manolo Blahnik, Jimmy Choo tend to come up slightly smaller and definitely narrower than high-street shoe brands. I tried on some Jimmy Choo knee-high boots last year and couldn't zip them over my calves! which is obviously ridiculous as my calves are if anything slimmer than average - I usually have the opposite problem with boots. still, it saved me £500.
Monday, 5 May 2008
Bra sizes: is it all meaningless?
I'm 29 and yet I have no idea what bra size I am. A couple of years ago I thought I knew, and since then, according to what I've been told by 'professionals', I've seen myself as everything from glamour-girl buxom to on the small side. And I doubt I'm alone.
Let me explain. For most of my 20s I thought I was a 36, even a 38, B to C. Then, last year, I got measured at Selfridges and was pronounced, to my infinite surprise and delight, a 34D. 'Oh, I must buy some bras in my new size and throw the old ones away' was my first thought. Cue credit card and £100 spent, over the next couple of months, on new bras.
A few months ago a PR invited me to get fitted at Bravissimo, which specialises in bras for 'big-boobed women' and my RSVP essentially read 'Thank you but I am sure I don't qualify.' She advised me to go despite my concerns, and lo and behold the fitter laughed her head off at my 34D bra and told me I was a 32E. She told me a 34D would just not support me and the fear in my mind was of prematurely sagging bosoms in my early 30s. Maybe, at a pinch, I could also be a 34DD, she said. But 32E was 'the size' for me.
Feeling like I'd turned into Pammy Anderson within seconds, the first thing on my to-do list was to make sure I had some bras in the 'right' size. Otherwise, I would have no support! I bought more than £50 of underwear in the moments that followed alone.
And my new 32E bra looked gorgeous on. It lifted me perfectly. The problem only emerged when I tried to wear the bra for more than ten minutes. It rubbed seriously, the bones of the underwire digging in so much they left me with dark wed welts. Obedient to the fitting, I forced myself to wear the bra even though I had to go somewhere private and pull it away from my chest to relieve the welts every hour. I even sewed little cushions I made from stuffing and an old handkerchief into the bra to stop it feeling so unbearably tight, but nothing worked and after a few days I simply gave up and went back to my 34Ds and DDs.
My mother, who also had a fitting at Bravissimo, had exactly the same experience of being told she was a smaller back size and bigger cup than she had ever thought possible, buying a pretty bra, and finding it is far too uncomfortable to wear.
Then, just this week, another fitting (this time for wedding underwear - ye gods) resulted in being told I am a 36C and that a DD would be gaping on me.
All of this has left me not knowing what size I am. Obviously all bras are made differently, and all shops measure differently, but surely there should be one or two standard sizes we can assume will fit us? My mother, more cynical than me, suspects lingerie shops deliberately ask us what size we wear and then tell us we are a different size (usually flattering us but making us sound slimmer in the back and bigger in the cup) in order to make us buy new bras. I'm not sure it's that premeditated, but perhaps I'm just naive.
The only question left to answer is why do I want to know what bra size I am? Is my need to fit into a category resolving some kind of insecurity, or boosting (literally) my self-esteem? When I was told I was a 32E I felt flattered and I can't deny my body image improved. The other day when I was slapped back down to a 36C I felt like I'd just been kidding myself believing I could be any bigger than that. It's quite sad how a size can determine one's emotions.
But there is a practical need to know what bra size you are and that is when it comes to every woman's requirement to be able to shop for a bra and have an idea of what sizes to try on - otherwise a trip to M&S could take forever. My question to the sizing experts is, what are we meant to do? Who do we trust? Do we wear what is comfortable, or do we wear what is supposedly supportive?
To this end, I have made an appointment today with the Queen's corsetieres, Rigby & Peller. I understand if there is one higher authority on bra sizing, they are it. Watch this space.
Let me explain. For most of my 20s I thought I was a 36, even a 38, B to C. Then, last year, I got measured at Selfridges and was pronounced, to my infinite surprise and delight, a 34D. 'Oh, I must buy some bras in my new size and throw the old ones away' was my first thought. Cue credit card and £100 spent, over the next couple of months, on new bras.
A few months ago a PR invited me to get fitted at Bravissimo, which specialises in bras for 'big-boobed women' and my RSVP essentially read 'Thank you but I am sure I don't qualify.' She advised me to go despite my concerns, and lo and behold the fitter laughed her head off at my 34D bra and told me I was a 32E. She told me a 34D would just not support me and the fear in my mind was of prematurely sagging bosoms in my early 30s. Maybe, at a pinch, I could also be a 34DD, she said. But 32E was 'the size' for me.
Feeling like I'd turned into Pammy Anderson within seconds, the first thing on my to-do list was to make sure I had some bras in the 'right' size. Otherwise, I would have no support! I bought more than £50 of underwear in the moments that followed alone.
And my new 32E bra looked gorgeous on. It lifted me perfectly. The problem only emerged when I tried to wear the bra for more than ten minutes. It rubbed seriously, the bones of the underwire digging in so much they left me with dark wed welts. Obedient to the fitting, I forced myself to wear the bra even though I had to go somewhere private and pull it away from my chest to relieve the welts every hour. I even sewed little cushions I made from stuffing and an old handkerchief into the bra to stop it feeling so unbearably tight, but nothing worked and after a few days I simply gave up and went back to my 34Ds and DDs.
My mother, who also had a fitting at Bravissimo, had exactly the same experience of being told she was a smaller back size and bigger cup than she had ever thought possible, buying a pretty bra, and finding it is far too uncomfortable to wear.
Then, just this week, another fitting (this time for wedding underwear - ye gods) resulted in being told I am a 36C and that a DD would be gaping on me.
All of this has left me not knowing what size I am. Obviously all bras are made differently, and all shops measure differently, but surely there should be one or two standard sizes we can assume will fit us? My mother, more cynical than me, suspects lingerie shops deliberately ask us what size we wear and then tell us we are a different size (usually flattering us but making us sound slimmer in the back and bigger in the cup) in order to make us buy new bras. I'm not sure it's that premeditated, but perhaps I'm just naive.
The only question left to answer is why do I want to know what bra size I am? Is my need to fit into a category resolving some kind of insecurity, or boosting (literally) my self-esteem? When I was told I was a 32E I felt flattered and I can't deny my body image improved. The other day when I was slapped back down to a 36C I felt like I'd just been kidding myself believing I could be any bigger than that. It's quite sad how a size can determine one's emotions.
But there is a practical need to know what bra size you are and that is when it comes to every woman's requirement to be able to shop for a bra and have an idea of what sizes to try on - otherwise a trip to M&S could take forever. My question to the sizing experts is, what are we meant to do? Who do we trust? Do we wear what is comfortable, or do we wear what is supposedly supportive?
To this end, I have made an appointment today with the Queen's corsetieres, Rigby & Peller. I understand if there is one higher authority on bra sizing, they are it. Watch this space.
A post from journalist Eileen McCabe
Seasoned journalist Eileen McCabe, who is currently writing a book about Tony Blair, is kind enough to let me post these comments she has just sent me. She raises some fascinating points about differences in size around the world (what Western woman isn't slightly afraid of what size she turns out to be in a Japanese or even French clothes shop?)and questions how fashion houses figure out figures.
Sizing comes within the same category as 5-a-day, 14 u of alcohol per week, no cigs, daily exercise, no red meat and lots of oily fish. They're all designed ot make us feel mega-guilty about our lifestyles and to what end? If you could measure the angst about what we eat and drink, going from size 10 to 12, what we do or don't do, there would be a mountain of goo-ey stress and nervous tension that debilitates and does much more harm to the body than not quite making the 5 or the devastating health risks of last night's grilled steak.
I can only remember one grandmother...I was eight when she died. I remember her face and beautiful thick white hair but I have no idea whether she was a size 8 or a size 20. She seemed to be wrapped in voluminous skirts and petticoats, and a shawl...who was to know or care? And she smoked a clay pipe and still managed to live to 84... I don't think she lost much sleep about her size.
Why do fashion houses do it? Why make the customer feel guilty and unwanted? Wander into Zara and I have to search for XL. Why be humiliated? thing is the clothes are lovely and v good value as long as you're a skinny minnie. it must be part of their marketing strategy that says we cater for the young and trendy who go for disposable clothes...and young and trendy people tend to be size 4/6/8...and if they're not, they should be. I know that I'm not as slim as I used to be but I hardly feel ready to be labelled XL.
However when we were in China a couple of years ago, I struggled to find anything to fit and because everything was so cheap, the search became serious. Finally I bought a stone coloured silk trouser suit ( for about a fiver) that is labelled XXXL....Now I forgave sizing there because it seemed to me that so many Chinese women are stick-thin... but the same can't be said in Europe or US.
Then how do you deal with yo-yo sizing? Lots of women can go up and down a full size in the course of a month. The marketing people say layering is the answer...the silky sloppy blouses and the chiffon smocks. It's good for business but a. not v flattering and b. unnecessary.
So here is one very simplistic solution:
Do away with sizing as we know it and have three basic sizes, small, medium and large (plus short, regular and long).
They would be determined by weight, not some fictional size8/10/12etc..
small: 7-9st
medium: 9st-11st
large: 11st and above.
If fashion houses standardised, then I would always know to go for a M(short). If I was at the lower end of 9-11, then I could probably afford to wear something slightly fitted... at the upper end, clothes that don't cling with a nice belt around the middle to give it some shape....but at least M(short) sets the parameters.
And I wouldn't feel guilty about slipping into the next size because there's room to manoeuvre within it (literally!)
It's a great project...and I would love to know what the fashion houses have to say about how their sizing policy is determined, something like : When God created Man, He created him to look as we dictate he should look.
Sizing comes within the same category as 5-a-day, 14 u of alcohol per week, no cigs, daily exercise, no red meat and lots of oily fish. They're all designed ot make us feel mega-guilty about our lifestyles and to what end? If you could measure the angst about what we eat and drink, going from size 10 to 12, what we do or don't do, there would be a mountain of goo-ey stress and nervous tension that debilitates and does much more harm to the body than not quite making the 5 or the devastating health risks of last night's grilled steak.
I can only remember one grandmother...I was eight when she died. I remember her face and beautiful thick white hair but I have no idea whether she was a size 8 or a size 20. She seemed to be wrapped in voluminous skirts and petticoats, and a shawl...who was to know or care? And she smoked a clay pipe and still managed to live to 84... I don't think she lost much sleep about her size.
Why do fashion houses do it? Why make the customer feel guilty and unwanted? Wander into Zara and I have to search for XL. Why be humiliated? thing is the clothes are lovely and v good value as long as you're a skinny minnie. it must be part of their marketing strategy that says we cater for the young and trendy who go for disposable clothes...and young and trendy people tend to be size 4/6/8...and if they're not, they should be. I know that I'm not as slim as I used to be but I hardly feel ready to be labelled XL.
However when we were in China a couple of years ago, I struggled to find anything to fit and because everything was so cheap, the search became serious. Finally I bought a stone coloured silk trouser suit ( for about a fiver) that is labelled XXXL....Now I forgave sizing there because it seemed to me that so many Chinese women are stick-thin... but the same can't be said in Europe or US.
Then how do you deal with yo-yo sizing? Lots of women can go up and down a full size in the course of a month. The marketing people say layering is the answer...the silky sloppy blouses and the chiffon smocks. It's good for business but a. not v flattering and b. unnecessary.
So here is one very simplistic solution:
Do away with sizing as we know it and have three basic sizes, small, medium and large (plus short, regular and long).
They would be determined by weight, not some fictional size8/10/12etc..
small: 7-9st
medium: 9st-11st
large: 11st and above.
If fashion houses standardised, then I would always know to go for a M(short). If I was at the lower end of 9-11, then I could probably afford to wear something slightly fitted... at the upper end, clothes that don't cling with a nice belt around the middle to give it some shape....but at least M(short) sets the parameters.
And I wouldn't feel guilty about slipping into the next size because there's room to manoeuvre within it (literally!)
It's a great project...and I would love to know what the fashion houses have to say about how their sizing policy is determined, something like : When God created Man, He created him to look as we dictate he should look.
Sunday, 27 April 2008
Why loose is foreign
At the small museum at New York's Fashion Institute of Technology, I visited an exhibition of clothes influenced by 'exoticism' this week. Looking at 1970s caftans and the 1920s tunics of the aesthetic movement, it became clear to me that the inspiration of cultures foreign to the west was often for loose, comfortable, practical clothes.
Unrestrictive Asian and African 'peasant' styles have stayed on the edges of the west's perennial modern fashion, a fetish of tightness. In the 1920s, to emulate the dress of the second and third worlds was to embrace a romantic freedom, to escape from nipped-in waists and moulded busts and bottoms.
Mariano Fortuny's 'Delphos' pleated dress recalled the robes of the ancient Greeks and Diaghilev's Ballets Russes set a fashion for loose oriental and Persian costumes. Glamorous fashion stores like Liberty sold robe-like tunics, suddenly envisioning a luxury in poverty.
Again, in the 1960s and 70s, loose kaftans and folk clothing were all the rage, making me wonder if loose sizing often reasserts itself in times of social upheaval.
The history of enthusiasm for large, loose sizes is fascinating. It's always been there, often promoted by pockets of unconventional, bohemian intellectuals, but for most of the time, in Victorian England for instance, anyone bucking the trend for small, tight sizes has been mocked and vilified.
Small sizes have for centuries been a sign of wealth in the west - as we see still today, with the richest western women usually the thinnest. And while loose, 'exotic' non western influences have occasionally swum into fashion, they are seen as somehow too forgiving, too uncontrolled, a sign of dissipation, a giving into the flesh. Loose clothing has meant loose morals since Medieval times in the west.
Today, with the globalisation of the fashion industry, you'd think we would have given up the peculiarly western notion of unforgivingly tight clothes sizes, yet if anything, western values are being rolled out across the world instead of listening to many other cultures' 'big is beautiful' wisdom.
Unrestrictive Asian and African 'peasant' styles have stayed on the edges of the west's perennial modern fashion, a fetish of tightness. In the 1920s, to emulate the dress of the second and third worlds was to embrace a romantic freedom, to escape from nipped-in waists and moulded busts and bottoms.
Mariano Fortuny's 'Delphos' pleated dress recalled the robes of the ancient Greeks and Diaghilev's Ballets Russes set a fashion for loose oriental and Persian costumes. Glamorous fashion stores like Liberty sold robe-like tunics, suddenly envisioning a luxury in poverty.
Again, in the 1960s and 70s, loose kaftans and folk clothing were all the rage, making me wonder if loose sizing often reasserts itself in times of social upheaval.
The history of enthusiasm for large, loose sizes is fascinating. It's always been there, often promoted by pockets of unconventional, bohemian intellectuals, but for most of the time, in Victorian England for instance, anyone bucking the trend for small, tight sizes has been mocked and vilified.
Small sizes have for centuries been a sign of wealth in the west - as we see still today, with the richest western women usually the thinnest. And while loose, 'exotic' non western influences have occasionally swum into fashion, they are seen as somehow too forgiving, too uncontrolled, a sign of dissipation, a giving into the flesh. Loose clothing has meant loose morals since Medieval times in the west.
Today, with the globalisation of the fashion industry, you'd think we would have given up the peculiarly western notion of unforgivingly tight clothes sizes, yet if anything, western values are being rolled out across the world instead of listening to many other cultures' 'big is beautiful' wisdom.
Tuesday, 22 April 2008
New York sizes
So, I've been in Manhattan for a few days now on holiday and am noticing all isn't as I thought when it comes to American sizing. Over in Blighty, we're constantly led to believe that in America, everyone is some kind of supersized, McDonalds-addicted heffalump. But in New York, at least, the women are slim, groomed and gorgeous. I've only seen two branches of McDonalds in four days. And when it comes to restaurants and corner shops, it's less Ginsters sausage rolls as we have in England, and more 100 varieties of salad and wholemeal Peruvian wrap.
Doubtless all this healthiness gets reversed as soon as you head for the midwest, but from where I'm standing, New York women look a lot healthier than your average Londoner.
Let loose in Bloomingdale's yesterday, I decided to buy a swimming costume and spent two hours trying on just about everything in the swimsuit section. The 'Magic Swimsuit' came with a label promising to make you look 10lbs smaller, but frankly there ain't no swimsuit in the world that can do that. A sales assistant told me that an American 10 is a British 12 - I had thought a British 12 was an American 8 (as does Natalie Cassidy - see my earlier post). Can anyone clear this up for me?
Doubtless all this healthiness gets reversed as soon as you head for the midwest, but from where I'm standing, New York women look a lot healthier than your average Londoner.
Let loose in Bloomingdale's yesterday, I decided to buy a swimming costume and spent two hours trying on just about everything in the swimsuit section. The 'Magic Swimsuit' came with a label promising to make you look 10lbs smaller, but frankly there ain't no swimsuit in the world that can do that. A sales assistant told me that an American 10 is a British 12 - I had thought a British 12 was an American 8 (as does Natalie Cassidy - see my earlier post). Can anyone clear this up for me?
Friday, 18 April 2008
Why it's the label, not the body, that counts
Here's a story that says a lot about the fact that it's the size on the label that matters to women as opposed to the way they look in the mirror.
The formerly cuddly EastEnders actress Natalie Cassidy has apparently dropped 2.5 stone in three months, taking her from a size 16 to an 8. But she's reportedly told gossip magazine Now that what she's really proud of is that 'I can fit into size zero jeans! I can't believe it. I have a pair of Gap jeans that are a UK size four, which is a US size zero.'
Many women will identify with Natalie's careful sizing calculations - in her case, that being a UK 4 means she's allowed into the US size zero category. Natalie's actual measurements and proportions are the same, whether she's a 4 or a zero. Yet it clearly matters to be classified a size zero, as opposed to a size 4, just as other women will work out that they're really a size 12 and not a 14 by shopping in stores with more generously-cut clothes or by telling their friends and partners they're a size smaller or a lower weight than the reality.
Women who care about clothes size are often pretty happy with the way they look when they stand in front of the mirror. The thing that actually gets them down about their bodies is not fitting the size they want to be.
Why does size matter so much to us - and was fitting the 'right' size as important to women in the past?
The formerly cuddly EastEnders actress Natalie Cassidy has apparently dropped 2.5 stone in three months, taking her from a size 16 to an 8. But she's reportedly told gossip magazine Now that what she's really proud of is that 'I can fit into size zero jeans! I can't believe it. I have a pair of Gap jeans that are a UK size four, which is a US size zero.'
Many women will identify with Natalie's careful sizing calculations - in her case, that being a UK 4 means she's allowed into the US size zero category. Natalie's actual measurements and proportions are the same, whether she's a 4 or a zero. Yet it clearly matters to be classified a size zero, as opposed to a size 4, just as other women will work out that they're really a size 12 and not a 14 by shopping in stores with more generously-cut clothes or by telling their friends and partners they're a size smaller or a lower weight than the reality.
Women who care about clothes size are often pretty happy with the way they look when they stand in front of the mirror. The thing that actually gets them down about their bodies is not fitting the size they want to be.
Why does size matter so much to us - and was fitting the 'right' size as important to women in the past?
Thursday, 17 April 2008
Control pants: coming back?
Over the 20th century, corsets and stays gave way to girdles and then eventually to the tyranny of the diet.
But it seems that body control garments are coming back into fashion. In Observer Woman, the popularity of Spanx control pants merited a six-page feature last Sunday. Writer Louise France says, having tried a pair, that they're a whole new generation of 'fat pants' which are actually 'comfy'.
Meanwhile, friends and I were recently talking about a makeover feature in a women's glossy magazine in which several women were shown how to dress to look several sizes smaller. We had all glanced at the feature with some interest but been disappointed to learn that the only reason these women looked so slim was because they were all wrapped from neck to lower thigh in hideous body control underwear.
God forbid that any woman kitted out in this way should want to take said clothes off in order to have sex. Or that they have an accident - a life could be lost while a paramedic struggled to cut through the mummy-like body wrapping.
But with sales of Spanx soaring, perhaps it's not completely unrealistic that some women would be keen enough to display a trimmer silhouette that they would be prepared to go to such extremes with their underwear.
It sure beats dieting, but who's actually wearing this stuff and is it really worth the inconvenience?
But it seems that body control garments are coming back into fashion. In Observer Woman, the popularity of Spanx control pants merited a six-page feature last Sunday. Writer Louise France says, having tried a pair, that they're a whole new generation of 'fat pants' which are actually 'comfy'.
Meanwhile, friends and I were recently talking about a makeover feature in a women's glossy magazine in which several women were shown how to dress to look several sizes smaller. We had all glanced at the feature with some interest but been disappointed to learn that the only reason these women looked so slim was because they were all wrapped from neck to lower thigh in hideous body control underwear.
God forbid that any woman kitted out in this way should want to take said clothes off in order to have sex. Or that they have an accident - a life could be lost while a paramedic struggled to cut through the mummy-like body wrapping.
But with sales of Spanx soaring, perhaps it's not completely unrealistic that some women would be keen enough to display a trimmer silhouette that they would be prepared to go to such extremes with their underwear.
It sure beats dieting, but who's actually wearing this stuff and is it really worth the inconvenience?
Were women smaller 30, 40, 50 years ago?
There's a lot of media fuss today about a 'new' lower than ever size: size zero, even size 00 or size -2. But some sources appear to show that a size zero today would have been called a size 8 in the 1950s: the measurements were around the same.
I'd like to hear any memories from women who remember buying clothes in the 1950s or 60s and can compare them with the sizes in today's shops. Were clothes smaller then, or now? Was a size 16 then what we call a size 12 today?
And what about older women, our mothers and grandmothers? Who doesn't have an elderly relative whose slenderness in photos from the 1930s makes us think women were much slimmer then? I asked my great aunt Phillis - still slim in her 80s - if women ate less when she was young and she said it was all thanks to the girdles and undergarments which not only controlled but reduced the bust, waist and hips. I'm interested in hearing from anyone who remembers differences in sizes in the early years of the 20th century, or who remembers how their mother or grandmother felt about dress size.
Please comment if you can!
I'd like to hear any memories from women who remember buying clothes in the 1950s or 60s and can compare them with the sizes in today's shops. Were clothes smaller then, or now? Was a size 16 then what we call a size 12 today?
And what about older women, our mothers and grandmothers? Who doesn't have an elderly relative whose slenderness in photos from the 1930s makes us think women were much slimmer then? I asked my great aunt Phillis - still slim in her 80s - if women ate less when she was young and she said it was all thanks to the girdles and undergarments which not only controlled but reduced the bust, waist and hips. I'm interested in hearing from anyone who remembers differences in sizes in the early years of the 20th century, or who remembers how their mother or grandmother felt about dress size.
Please comment if you can!
Size 16s under attack
In this article in the Daily Mail, nutritionist Monica Grenfell attacks 17-year-old Miss England contestant Chloe Marshall for being a size 16, calling her size a 'shocking lack of self-control'. Monica writes 'It's a total fallacy that young girls are being pressured into near-starving themselves into being too thin.'
She believes Chloe is 'undeniably overweight', explaining: 'At 5ft 10in, Chloe should have a body mass index, or BMI, (indicating her levels of fat) of 20. Hers is 26.03....And if Chloe is so overweight at barely 17, one shudders to imagine just how fat she will be a few years down the line.'
It's surprising that, given the epidemic of eating disorders among young women, a nutritionist would be caught dead saying girls aren't at risk of wanting to be too thin, let alone promoting a BMI of 20 as the ideal. A BMI of 20 is on the low side of the normal, healthy range, but a BMI of 24.9 is equally normal and healthy, according to all responsible medical guidelines. Any doctor would tell Monica that there is no such thing as an exact 'one BMI fits all' weight - we all have a natural healthy weight within a reasonable range. Plus, a BMI of 26 is only slightly over the recommended range and most doctors and nutritionists would probably see it as perfectly normal and healthy: it can hardly be accurately descibed as 'so overweight'.
Any woman with an eating disorder who reads Monica's extreme size diatribe is likely to feel her insecurities triggered and it's likely that the article will have encouraged many women who are already at a healthy weight to try to diet down to a BMI of 20.
Monica goes on to talk about her experiences as a Miss England judge, saying: 'I was struck by how elegant, charming and yes, fit, the girls were. None of them was underweight.'
In 2005 I did a reportage feature on what went on backstage at the Miss England contest for Real magazine. While I didn't see any obvious anorexics, at least one size-eight girl that year was on a Slim-Fast diet and seemed very anxious about appearing half naked in front of the judges in case she looked chubby. It didn't strike me as a healthy, fit environment for young girls.
Monica claims that to be overweight is now fashionable, but what normal woman would agree with that? I don't know a single woman who wants to be overweight. There's no pressure to be a size 16 - not that that, the average UK size, is in any way outrageously plump in my book, as this article would have us believe. The consensus among women is to be a size 12 or smaller, and where does that pressure come from? It comes from articles like this one by Monica Grenfell - what a surprise. It's impossible to read her article as anything more than a size 12 and not feel guilty.
A size 16 is only two sizes bigger than a size 12 and is a much more common size, yet being a size 16 draws vitriolic attacks from the press while a size 12 is seen as OK. It's enough to make you pity any woman over a size 12 in the public eye, especially one so young as Chloe.
She believes Chloe is 'undeniably overweight', explaining: 'At 5ft 10in, Chloe should have a body mass index, or BMI, (indicating her levels of fat) of 20. Hers is 26.03....And if Chloe is so overweight at barely 17, one shudders to imagine just how fat she will be a few years down the line.'
It's surprising that, given the epidemic of eating disorders among young women, a nutritionist would be caught dead saying girls aren't at risk of wanting to be too thin, let alone promoting a BMI of 20 as the ideal. A BMI of 20 is on the low side of the normal, healthy range, but a BMI of 24.9 is equally normal and healthy, according to all responsible medical guidelines. Any doctor would tell Monica that there is no such thing as an exact 'one BMI fits all' weight - we all have a natural healthy weight within a reasonable range. Plus, a BMI of 26 is only slightly over the recommended range and most doctors and nutritionists would probably see it as perfectly normal and healthy: it can hardly be accurately descibed as 'so overweight'.
Any woman with an eating disorder who reads Monica's extreme size diatribe is likely to feel her insecurities triggered and it's likely that the article will have encouraged many women who are already at a healthy weight to try to diet down to a BMI of 20.
Monica goes on to talk about her experiences as a Miss England judge, saying: 'I was struck by how elegant, charming and yes, fit, the girls were. None of them was underweight.'
In 2005 I did a reportage feature on what went on backstage at the Miss England contest for Real magazine. While I didn't see any obvious anorexics, at least one size-eight girl that year was on a Slim-Fast diet and seemed very anxious about appearing half naked in front of the judges in case she looked chubby. It didn't strike me as a healthy, fit environment for young girls.
Monica claims that to be overweight is now fashionable, but what normal woman would agree with that? I don't know a single woman who wants to be overweight. There's no pressure to be a size 16 - not that that, the average UK size, is in any way outrageously plump in my book, as this article would have us believe. The consensus among women is to be a size 12 or smaller, and where does that pressure come from? It comes from articles like this one by Monica Grenfell - what a surprise. It's impossible to read her article as anything more than a size 12 and not feel guilty.
A size 16 is only two sizes bigger than a size 12 and is a much more common size, yet being a size 16 draws vitriolic attacks from the press while a size 12 is seen as OK. It's enough to make you pity any woman over a size 12 in the public eye, especially one so young as Chloe.
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