Fashioning Fat: Inside Plus-Size Modeling (6 page)

Like Alice, I peered into the plus-size looking glass to find a fantastical world governed by strict aesthetic rules. According to its logic, I was no longer considered an average body type but, rather, “plus size.” I followed a path where my body was measured, objectified, and paraded before the public. This book follows the everyday production process within modeling agencies that began with my entrance into the field and concluded with my transformation into a product of constructed images that idealized a larger body.

In
chapter 2
, I present the faces of plus-size beauty. I discuss their backgrounds and entrance into modeling, as well as their career prospects and modeling ambitions.
Chapter 3
presents a discussion of the nature of size in a fashion industry that is clouded by inconsistency and confusion. What is considered plus size in modeling does not exactly fall into the same categorical schema in general retail practice nor match the cultural image of a plus-size woman. Highlighting the cases of the models Velvet D’Amour, Whitney Thompson, and Crystal Renn, I show that there is more variation among plus-size models in terms of both body type and size when compared to the strict body standard of straight-size models.

An examination of the social construction of beauty cannot begin and end with the models themselves. Such an investigation would fail to capture the complete aesthetic labor process involved in constructing an image. The models’ agents and clients dictate each step of the production of beauty. In
chapter 4
, I document an intensive aesthetic labor process, whereby these models continually developed their bodies according to
the demands of their fashion employers. In modeling, an inch here or there really does matter. These models face intense pressures from their agents to alter their bodies. In order to work in fashion, they utilize their bodies as capital and embark on a variety of body projects at the risk of losing work opportunities and agency representation.
Chapter 5
discusses the agents themselves, the fashion gatekeepers who are responsible for a model’s career.

While models are subject to the corporeal demands from their agents, clothing designers dictate fashion trends and aesthetics. In
chapter 6
, I explore the products of modeling work—the images conveyed in retail marketing campaigns—and a new crop of designers who, themselves, identify as plus-size. This burgeoning field of plus-size designers that self-identify as plus-size women, offer the unique case of establishing a clothing market
of
and
for
their own. As plus-size women, they hold the key to challenging contemporary bodily aesthetics that privilege the thin body.

Chapter 7
explores the impact these various plus-size fashion professionals—the models, agents, and designers—have on cultural representations of fat bodies. The fashion machine hides the backstage labor process from consumers, who never see the physical labors a model endures to fit an image dictated by fashion professionals. Fashion also ignores health concerns. Instead, consumers receive a commercial image of a “plus-size” beauty—joyful, desirable, and free from bodily imperfections.

By examining the complete aesthetic labor process—both the front stage and backstage behaviors—and the relationships between these cultural producers, I show that a plus-size model’s performance does not result in the reclamation of her embodiment. Yes, the plus-size model challenges contemporary bodily aesthetics that privilege the thin body, demonstrates that fat can be sexy, and feels empowered while doing it. At the individual level, she succeeds in overcoming years of self-loathing and shame over her body. Furthermore, the entrepreneurial designers who identify as plus size do envision a new aesthetic for fat women. However, the day-to-day interactions between a plus-size model and her
agent reveal the model’s lack of control in the construction of the image of beauty. At the institutional level, the fashion industry perpetuates her objectification. A plus-size model conforms to an image created by fashion’s tastemakers. Her body fits within narrowly defined parameters of
their
choosing. Ultimately, she molds her body to fit an image instead of molding an image of beauty to fit her body. Within this occupational structure, she is voiceless and disembodied.

In this book, I give her a voice and try to recognize her body on its own terms.

A week after the call from the assistant, I boarded a downtown subway to the modeling agency. As the subway car zipped past station after station, I clutched my bag in nervous anticipation of the meeting. My bag held the additional snapshots the agency had requested that my roommate took of me in a haphazard photo shoot in our living room a couple of days before. A flurry of thoughts filled the darkness of the underground—
Will this meeting end like the last? Was this a foolhardy idea doomed to fail?

When I emerged on street level from the depths of the subway station, I quickly found the office building and then backtracked to a drug store around the corner. When I went to auditions as a child actor, my mom and I rode into the city on the commuter rail system, hopped on the subway, and then stopped at any fast-food restaurant within the vicinity of the audition location for a cup of standard, orange pekoe tea and small fries. (This was before coffee shops replaced the ubiquitous fast food joint on every Manhattan city block.) It became our ritual that helped me to mentally distance myself from the stresses of the school day and prepare myself for the audition. On this day, I was too nervous for a cup of tea and simply wanted to inconspicuously check my hair and makeup.

I returned to the building promptly at 11:15 a.m. for my 11:30 a.m. appointment and rode the elevator up to the agency’s suite. When the doors opened, a rush of sights and sounds did not greet me as in the last agency. Instead, the décor was rather sparse. A mere potted plant and a stand-alone air purifier accented the off-white walls of the reception area.
The receptionist handed me some paperwork to fill out and directed me to a pair of chairs against the opposite wall. I waited, again.

I was sitting in the center of daily operations for this mid-sized agency, which employed up to eight modeling agents. Agents swirled about the facility, scampering from one office to another, often pausing at reception to chat with the young woman answering the phones or pick up bundles of mail. From my seat, I heard an agent haggle over the phone with a client about an upcoming television commercial. Another complained to a client about a delayed payment. The constant chatter and underlying buzz from the air purifier lulled me into a state of complacency such that I had not noticed that an hour had passed. Finally, I was called into the director’s office.

I entered. On a desk in front of me were piles of photos and proof sheets. To my left, shelves displaying the faces of dozens of plus-size models with ruby lips and smoky eyes stared down at me. These were the director’s “girls”; they were his business. I wanted my picture up on that wall.

Having failed to learn from my previous interaction with a modeling agent, I was caught off guard by a lack of personal introduction. Instead, in rapid-fire succession, Bobby, the director, detailed my fate as a plus-size model while he visually sized me up aloud:

You’re cute and have a good personality but a bit small for plus. We start at [size] fourteen but you may be right for fit and commercial [modeling]. You have good eyes, teeth, and well proportioned . . . You will have to maintain your shape . . . Besides fit modeling, you could do showroom and commercial print for catalogues, cute little articles in magazines like
Marie Claire
, and commercials like Verizon . . . You are more of the Banana Republic look . . . classier, sophisticated.

At some point during his verbal tirade, I reckoned this was a sales pitch to tantalize my model dreams, throwing me candy bits with recognizable retailers and markets to bait me. As much as I tried to sell myself to this agent, he tried to sell his services to me. I felt relieved that Bobby,
a fashion insider, thought I might have a future in modeling. The first agency open call left me discouraged, but now I was hopeful, my confidence bolstered. His positive evaluation of my body and “look” was the validation I needed to pursue this adventure. I could do this.

Before agreeing to work with me on a freelance basis, Bobby required that I “test,” i.e., have photos taken by a professional fashion photographer to see how I perform in front of a camera and acquire high-quality photos for my portfolio. After the test shoot, we would meet again to discuss my modeling future and “get rolling.” He handed me a photographer’s business card and directed me out the door. My modeling journey had officially begun.

The nature of modeling work suggests that models are different from the general population. Compounding the difficulty of working under the conditions of impersonality, objectification, and necessary corporal discipline, plus-size models face additional scrutiny due to the negative cultural view of fat. While Erving Goffman’s view of stigma suggests that fat women would be more inclined to cover up their curves and excess flesh, these women chose to enter a field where they publicly parade their fat bodies for a discerning public. Essentially, it is this very courage to flaunt their bodies that sets plus-size models apart from traditional, straight-size models. These women shed a penetrating layer of shame and guilt built up over the years to reveal a new, confident self that was no longer afraid to enjoy her size and shape. These plus-size models broke with conventional interpretations of their social identity by flaunting their fat bodies in hopes of changing the cultural discourse.
¹

The typical routes to enter into plus-size modeling include the former straight-size model, the performer, the outsider, and the self-promoter. In the first type, a straight-size model discovered plus-size modeling after she failed to maintain a thin physique. As plus size, she tends to inhabit the smaller end of the size spectrum. In the second, a non-model
working in entertainment booked a modeling job because of their status as a performer and then continued modeling after that initial experience. In the third, a fashion insider recruited a woman without any previous modeling experience. In the fourth, a woman entered the field of her own volition without the aid of a network connection. As my own case demonstrates, this is possible but requires a great deal of determination and luck to acquire contacts. Success, by any route, is rare.

Some of today’s top earning plus-size models began their modeling careers as straight-size models. Crystal Renn’s career trajectory is a prime example of this route. After struggling to maintain weight as a straight-size model by exercising for eight hours a day, Crystal transitioned to plus-size modeling:

You know, I was so happy for once, and I was really comfortable in who I was. You know, whereas before, I was completely unhappy, and you know, scared and insecure. It was a whole different me . . . I really learned—it took me six years, but I learned to be who I was.
²

Livia’s story is another example of this transition. While working as a size seven fit model in Los Angeles, Livia’s body “gave up” on her due to hunger and dehydration, so she decided to move to New York, where she discovered plus-size modeling. Clarissa, too, switched to plus-size modeling after a couple of, self-described, unsuccessful years as a straight-size model:

I was told my boobs were too big, my hips too wide. I wasn’t booking work and trying to lose [weight] wasn’t working . . . I stopped fighting my body and found a new career in plus[-size modeling].

As a size fourteen commercial print model, Clarissa booked more jobs than when she was a smaller size.

In their first stints as models, these formers tried to maintain a thin model body type to the detriment of their own health and emotional well-being, exacerbated by the pressures of working alongside pre-teen models with extraordinarily high metabolisms. They felt like failures as their bodies changed despite their best efforts. Livia admitted that she felt uncomfortable with her body as it began to change: “I believed I had to cover myself up. I was ashamed I couldn’t control it [her body] . . . I failed at my job.” These formers tried to mold their bodies to match the thin model expectation; yet, in that very process of losing weight, they gained insecurity and body loathing.

Once these former straight-size models discovered plus-size modeling, they found a place where they embraced their bodies and even modeled alongside straight-size models. “When I stopped trying to fit the mold my agency wanted [as a straight-size model],” Clarissa explained, “I entered a kind of happy place. I made peace with my body.” As plus-size models, their bodies, which no longer fit the normative expectation of a straight-size fashion model, were valued for their natural curves.

Another freelance, size sixteen/eighteen model, Janice, agreed with the sentiments of the formers:

Despite all the problems in this [modeling] industry, I’m rewarded for being myself. I’m grateful for there to be such an industry. I’m honored to take part in this field where I can potentially change minds about beauty.

She was thankful for the opportunity to work in a field where she could be herself in her fat body. Janice fell within the second type of recruitment—performance artists, such as actors and singers, who were offered modeling work and then decided to pursue additional modeling opportunities. Primarily an actor, Janice earned the much-coveted SAG (Screen Actors Guild) card from, to her own disbelief, booking a modeling
commercial. A self-described “chubby” girl, Janice never thought of her body as something useful, let alone something that would bolster her acting career. She understood that to act, she needed to be thinner, but as a plus-size model Janice could be her two hundred-pound self. Armed with the good fortune of receiving union benefits, she focused on auditioning for acting jobs, but admitted that modeling jobs were more lucrative and she intended to continue to model until she got her big acting break.