Weight debate casts shadow over London Fashion Week

[Celebration]

Maybe this controversy will cause the fashion industry to take a hard look at this topic. A lot of us don't want the government to "ban" anything, myself included. Sometimes, though, all it takes is a spark to change. It would be great if some powerful people would look at this issue and maybe consider some boycotts of designers that use ultrathin models. I think I read that five out of something like sixty eight models were not allowed on the runway in Madrid. The entire article is very good (also short)


http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=healthNews&storyID=2006-09-18T165304Z_01_L18815958_RTRUKOC_0_US-LIFE-LONDON-FASHION.xml&WTmodLoc=NewsHome-C3-healthNews-3

London opened its spring/summer fashion week on Monday, but there was more attention on the body size of its models than on what clothes they were wearing.

Days of debate about whether wafer-thin women are too tiny for the catwalk because their appearance may encourage eating disorders has pushed the clothes out of the limelight and left organizers begging for a change to the subject.

"Some controversy can be helpful, but what we have seen over the past days is not the way to hold a proper debate on the issue," Marks & Spencer Chief Executive Stuart Rose, chairman of the British Fashion Council organizing the event, told Reuters on the sidelines of an opening show.


Britain's premier fashion event has found itself under siege after health experts and Culture Minister Tessa Jowell suggested it should consider following the suit of Madrid which last week announced it would ban too-tiny women from its shows.

[LisaM]

1. Well boo-fucking-hoo

I am tired of being confronted with clothes meant for a woman without breasts.

[Warpy]

2. Without breasts, without hips, without an arse...

Honestly, somebody needs to do something about clothing designers whose hearts are in designing for the only people who are naturally built like the heroin chic runway mannequins, drag queens.

You'd think it would be an appealing challenge to design for real women, all the tailoring required to fit all the curves and protrusions, but NOOOO. They design for animated hatracks.

I suppose designing for drag shows doesn't pay as well.

[bloom]

4. quotes from Armani:

Guest editing Britain's Independent newspaper, Armani conceded that he had always used models "on the slender side", adding: "This was because the clothes I design and the sort of fabrics I use need to hang correctly on the body".

"I do not feel responsible for setting a trend towards models who look anorexic ... unfortunately, there are a lot of young women who never accept that they are thin enough -- and this is an illness," he said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060921/en_afp/afpentertainmentbritainitalyfashionarmani

_______________


"hang correctly"- I think it really quite stupid that they design for anorexic women - they should be designing for women of all sorts - and Armani IS responsible - whether he admits it or not - for promoting the trend toward the anorexic look.

It does seem to me too - that the trend is to design for men's (boys?) bodies (consciously or not) but that it wouldn't be profitable to say so.

[LisaM]

3. Well it would require dressmaking talent to design such clothes

Not just DESIGN talent.

[Celebration]

5. Israel following suit

http://www.israel21c.org/bin/en.jsp?enDispWho=Articles%5El1429&enPage=BlankPage&enDisplay=view&enDispWhat=object&enVersion=0&enZone=Culture

Two years ago, leading Israeli fashion photographer and fashion agency head Adi Barkan initiated a campaign to fight anorexia among models in the fashion industry in Israel. And now the movement is spreading globally.

The Madrid Fashion Week last week banned underweight models from appearing, and subsequently British Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell and Milan Mayor Letizia Moratti have called on the London Fashion Week and the Milan fashion industry to respectively follow suit.

In Israel, Barkan's efforts have also paid off - the leading Israeli retail companies have agreed not to employ overly thin models for their advertisements. Barkan said he had secured commitments from firms that account for 60 percent of advertising volume in Israel to turn away models whose body mass index - the ratio of height to weight - is less than 18.

"The average BMI among our models is 14. The new pact comes into effect next week, when we expect all the major fashion agencies to sign on," Barkan told Reuters. He said underweight models would have a grace period to catch up.

[Nikia]

6. This article shows why this is a good thing

"The average BMI among our models is 14."
There are people who will argue that some women are naturually thin or that being somewhat underweight is not unhealthy.
A BMI of 14 is emaciated and responsible doctors would be treating a young woman who was that thin, whether by getting that woman eating disorder treatment or by searching and treating some other medical problem. Young women who are that thin are risking their lives.
Might some women who are just under the BMI be healthy and naturually thin? Perhaps a few, but this is a good guideline and will decrease eating disorers and behaviors amongst models, aspiring models, and those who look up to them.