From neglected segment to a major trend: a look into the history of plus-size fashion

Jill Kortleve,
Ashley Graham, Jari Jones, Paloma Elsesser, Alexis Ruby. These are names of
plus-size models whose popularity is intrinsically linked to inclusive
fashion. From Chanel to Coach, they are the face of a trend for fashion to
now accept diversity of the female body. Or is that too short-sighted? Does
the clothing industry really care about the plus size fashion market?

Taking stock of plus size fashion, FashionUnited delves into its history
with Lauren Downing Peters. The American teacher-researcher devoted a
dissertation to the ‘stoutwear’ fashion market in the early 20th century –
an English term used to describe clothing intended for fuller women.
Entitled “Stoutwear and the Discourses of Disorder: Fashioning the Fat,
Female Body in American Fashion in the Age of Standardization, 1915-1930”,
her dissertation offers guidance on this topic.

Why did you decide to study stoutwear? What was your motivation?

Lauren Downing Peters : “I was fascinated by this subject when I graduated
from the MA Fashion Studies program at the Parsons School of Design in
2010. In our introductory theory course, we were introduced to the work of
Joanne Entwistle, who theorized dress as an “entity in which the body is
embedded in the social world and fundamental to the micro-social order”.
Her theory, based on Michel Foucault’s thinking, states that what we wear
is determined by the standards and expectations of the societies and
communities in which we live and, most importantly, that the human body is
fundamentally clothed.”

“I think 2010 was also the year in which plus-size fashion really became
mainstream. Gabourey Sidibe graced the cover of V Magazine and Crystal Renn
published her memoir ‘Hungry’. Thus sparked discussions about how the
gatekeepers of fashion decide which bodies are ‘in’ or ‘out’. This got me
thinking about how women whose bodies do not conform to prevailing beauty
ideals and who may or may not identify as ‘plus-size’ struggle with a
stigmatized identity with the desire to be fashionable.”

“This was essentially the topic of my MA thesis. When I joined the
Center for Fashion Studies at Stockholm University in 2013, I realized that
the history of this industry was largely unwritten. That’s how I found out
that I was studying the ‘stoutwear’ industry, which has been called the
plus-size fashion industry from the twentieth century onwards.”

Can you explain how plus-size fashion was presented and sold to the
customer in the period studied? What’s the difference compared with
today?

In this early period, ‘stoutwear’, as it was called, was considered a minor
category of women’s ready-to-wear clothing. By 1915 it was almost as if the
manufacturers realized that fuller women were a viable consumer class and
so the stoutwear industry was born to meet their needs; however, these
manufacturers may not have been so keen to woo them.”

“Consumer psychology was really on the rise at this point and so there
was a deep desire to understand the fuller woman. So much was written
within the trade journals about how and to what extent the fuller woman was
different from her slim counterparts and what drove her to consume.
Ultimately, they found that disgust for her own body and social anxiety
were the main factors driving the fuller woman to consume.”

“In the media in this period you therefore see stoutwear (in this
article we use the English term stoutwear, because this is the subject that
Lauren Downing Peters has studied and there is no comparable term in Dutch,
ed.) as ‘slimming’. Moreover, you see that plus-size clothing is sold in a
separate department, far away from the clothing in standard sizes. This was
due to the marketers’ insights that plus-size women prefer to shop in a
separate department, away from prying eyes.”

“While the fashion industry is certainly (albeit slowly) changing (think
Rihanna’s recent Fenty show, with models of all shapes and sizes), it’s
interesting to me that the insights that the merchandising and advertising
of stoutwear has in the early twentieth century, are largely unchanged
today. Much of this has to do with the fact that being fuller is still a
stigma in the West, even though body-positive discourses are increasingly
common in the fashion world.”

What do you think of the plus-size fashion industry today?

“I am often asked whether I think body positivity and size inclusivity are
simply the latest trend that fashion brands are clinging to to stay
relevant. Because I have the background knowledge of fashion history, I
regret to say that everything indicates that this is a trend.”

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“I think that’s because I don’t see many mainstream and high fashion
brands that really embrace inclusivity. Using a few plus-size models on
your catwalk doesn’t immediately get you involved. Also, using a size 38
model to advertise your new line of ‘curve’ jeans or yoga leggings doesn’t
make you inclusive. It’s no secret that the fashion industry is struggling
(even well before the corona crisis), and I see somewhat cynically the
sudden embrace of the fashion of non-standard size models as a futile
attempt to remain relevant and solvable.

That said, there are a lot of interesting advancements from startups and
from brands that have always cared about plus-size consumers. For example,
Universal Standard has expanded their size range to a US size 32 and the
underwear startup TomboyX has recently expanded their non-binary size range
to 6X.”

“While these brands aren’t selling high fashion that would fit in a
fashion magazine, the products they sell – jeans, t-shirts and underwear –
fill long-neglected gaps in the market in what could be considered an
inclusive range of sizes.”