Fashioning Fat: Inside Plus-Size Modeling (14 page)

After eliminating soda from her diet, Anna noticed positive changes to her body and energy level. Switching to water helped even out her complexion. On the other hand, Janice found that the natural pace of living in Manhattan facilitated a sufficient level of bodily management. “I do not go to the gym,” she confidently stated. “Never again. I walk everywhere, take the subway, [and] live in a fifth floor walkup [apartment].”

These models managed their physical capital daily, from making minor adjustments in lifestyle to investing in more intensive body projects involving dermatological and orthodontic treatments. Some had to binge and overeat to increase their size. Samantha confessed that on more than one occasion she had purposefully ingested salty foods the night before a meeting with a client in order to retain water and be the correct, slightly larger size for a fitting.

Unlike athletes who have coaches to monitor their progress, these models labored over their bodies alone. They became their own coaches and cheerleaders. Their bodies were both subject and object, mindfully
managed through self-monitoring and discipline. For these plus-size models, they were their bodies and their bodies were their careers.

As we see from this aesthetic labor process, these women went from “doing looks” to “doing plus size.” Working within an institution that places a high economic value on the physical body, these models wage a personal battle to control and discipline their bodies. This pressure intensified for those women who work as fit models.

During an ordinary research-oriented evening sitting in front of my computer and perusing a stack of articles from
Women’s Wear Daily
(a fashion-industry trade journal), I received a call from an agent at the modeling agency with which I was signed. The agent informed me that there was a new “fit” client who wanted to see me. “Great,” I hastily replied, until the agent continued, “for lingerie and swimwear.” Up until that point, I had modeled casual and evening attire. The thought of parading in underwear for a couple of strangers while being poked, prodded, and pinned roused all of my bodily insecurities. In lingerie or swimwear, you cannot hide, securely nestled within a pair of control top pantyhose or Spanx. The flesh is on full display, and, depending on the style and cut of said garment, my body—flaws and all—would be visible.

I could not decline the casting, lest I forgo my relationship with the agency. So, for the next few days before the scheduled meeting, I resumed my lapsed Pilates and cardio routine and fasted with a detoxifying cranberry concoction. I prepped both my body for its possible full disclosure and my self-conscious mind for humiliation and, what I feared most, the client’s revelation that I was absolutely clueless about fashion design.

The day of the fit casting, I headed to the specified address in midtown Manhattan, where I was buzzed inside a design factory showroom. A drone emanating from the rows of active sewing machines accompanied my stroll to the back, where I was handed a pair of pajamas and asked to change behind a screen. The client then measured me, took snapshots
from the front, side, and back, and asked me questions about the feel and fit of the pajamas. I was then asked to try on a nightgown, as she explained that these were items from a new line aimed at mature women, designed for a private label brand of a leading discount department store. Within a span of ten minutes, the casting was done and I had dodged a scantily clad bullet.

Fashion designers and clothing manufacturers hire fit models to try on garments at various stages of production to determine the fit and appearance of the garment on a live person. Thus, a fit model’s job is to comment on the material and the cut of the garment with respect to its fit and feel as she moves about the way the customer would in the future. The model gives this feedback to the designer before the garment is mass-produced. As one agent described to me, “The fit model is the designer’s muse.” Fit modeling jobs are billed hourly, with New York City rates ranging from $125 up to $300 per hour, and designers prefer to use the same model throughout a design season; hence, the hours can add up to profitable work. For example, one fit model in my sample earned on average $27,000 a year from fit clients alone. In addition, fit work may potentially lead to print work for the client.

It is essential to this process for the model’s measurements to remain constant in order to ensure a consistency of sizing and fit in garment production.
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As a fit model warned, “If she [the model] is bloated and they [the designers] fit the garment larger, women [in the stores] will think they lost weight.” In other words, a designer’s usual size fourteen pant may feel roomier than last season’s version to the average consumer. While based on a form, the true fit and size of a garment are dependent on the fit model used during fittings. Therefore, the model needs to maintain specific dimensions and proportions, often to within an inch of those she had when she started working for the client.

A fit model is not hired for her perfect body but, rather, for her consistent body. So, throughout the process, clients record and track every inch of a model’s body. Changes in her dimensions and proportions could mean lost jobs. Clients fired models whose weight fluctuated. Sarah, a
size fourteen/sixteen model, explained to me that she had a recurring working relationship with one designer until she lost ten pounds:

I was diagnosed with Celiac disease and couldn’t eat bread anymore, so I lost weight because I couldn’t eat the major food group of my diet. The client was not too happy with my weight loss and fired me. I don’t know what I was more pissed at—losing a client or losing bread.

Those ten pounds meant the end of her steady work opportunity.

For some models, this amplified pressure to maintain one’s exact measurements in fit modeling countered the financial benefits. Holly, a size sixteen model, refused to work fit jobs because of her history with an eating disorder. She explained, “I know I can make some good money but the last thing that I’m gonna do is worry like that. I can keep this [body] in check but I’m not gonna worry about every pound.” Holly successfully disciplined her body so that she maintained her size in order to work in commercial print and runway, but she feared that the added strain of working as a fit model would trigger an eating disorder relapse.

What happens if a model fails to maintain her weight? The case of fit model Janice offers a telling tale of what can happen when a plus-size model loses weight. When I spoke to Janice, she had recently lost weight as an unintended consequence from an attempt at bodily improvement. She invested in a retainer to straighten her teeth; however, it was not until after the retainer was made that the doctor instructed her that she would have to wear it for twenty-three hours a day. In order to eat, she would have to remove it and then brush her teeth before she put it back on. As a result of the inconvenience this orthodontic treatment caused, Janice lost twenty pounds in a matter of weeks.

When Janice went to her fitting jobs, she noticed a marked difference in the reactions of the clients who disapproved of her weight loss. A
designer client, who hired Janice to fit dresses, sweaters, and shirts for the past three years, stood in horror and exclaimed, “I am going to have to measure you. You lost weight.”

To Janice’s own amazement, she had lost three inches in her waist and four inches in her bust and hips. The client then replaced Janice with some other “big girl.” Because of this dramatic weight loss, Janice no longer fit the position as fit model and lost about $5,000 a year from this one fit client alone. Having lost the weight and a well-regarded job opportunity, Janice experienced a shame equivalent to that one feels after gaining weight. Confused, she confided, “I hate being told it [the weight loss] is wrong. It is my body.”

At another job doing line work for a nationwide retailer, where fit models of various sizes literally line up to model the latest design collection for corporate directors, Janice tried on her usual size eighteen pant, but after buttoning the waist, the pants fell to the floor. She was immediately given a smaller size pant:

I felt like I was being arrested. The looks I got from these people. I started to give a monologue to the directors, saying I had just had food poisoning and made cracks about eating muffins to gain the weight back.

Conflicted by the demand from her clients that she needed to gain back at least ten pounds and worry about paying bills, Janice broke down under the pressure and bought weight gaining powder.

In an industry where the body is a commodified object, a model may sometimes need to engage in deviant behaviors to remain marketable. As in the aforementioned case, when fit clients fired Janice because she lost too much weight, she returned to the binge mentality she learned years ago while in college, where she would binge on carbohydrates and cheese and then exercise the next day. This time, however, she did not exercise the next day but, instead, “walked slow” and carried a jar of peanut butter in her bag, consuming it by the spoonful. Janice suffered flashbacks from that previous episode in her life and could no
longer stomach her daily Ensure shakes mixed with strawberries and ice cream.

As a newly slimmed down plus-size model, Janice experienced resistance from fit clients, who demanded that she return to her larger size. Janice struggled with the issue of having to gain weight in an unhealthy manner, something she never thought she would have to do as a plus-size model. Here, the fit clients demanded a specific body that Janice could not provide.

This push toward fatness and gaining weight is counter to what contemporary American culture dictates about women’s bodies. While fashion urges everyday women to lose weight, fashion urges plus-size models, at times, to gain weight. One model admitted that her agent took her out to dinner and encouraged her to eat in order to gain a size. Models push their bodies to extremes. Fashion allows these women to be fat, and, sometimes, urges them to get fatter in order to build their model physical capital.

In the fall of 2011, TLC premiered a reality program called
Big Sexy
that featured five self-identified plus-size women who worked in the fashion industry as models, stylists, and makeup artists. Their mission was to challenge contemporary bodily aesthetics that privileged the thin body and equate fat with sex appeal. In an interview for
The Huffington Post
, one of the featured women, Heather, explained, “You can be whatever size you want to be and work in the fashion industry.”
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However, in the first episode of the program, the audience learned that her statement was an exaggeration as we watched another cast member, Tiffany, meet with her modeling agent. In the exchange, the agent informed Tiffany that a client wanted her to lose weight and that “it’s a waste of time and money if the numbers are not right.” Tiffany’s measurements had increased since the agent last took her measurements, and Tiffany would need to lose between seven and ten pounds to meet the client’s size expectations. At
her present size, Tiffany was dangerously close to exceeding the boundaries of plus size required of models.

Modeling agents were responsible for advising their models on how to present themselves to prospective clients—what to wear to castings, what to say to clients. In exchange for offering their models access to castings and clients, agents expected full disclosure and compliance from them. Models and their agents engaged in an intimate working relationship, where even private matters of the body were subject to public scrutiny. Individual body projects, such as simply changing a hair style and color or something more extreme such as getting a tattoo or body piercing, were negotiated and evaluated together with the agent based on issues of fashion trends and employment potential. Agents determined the final look of their models. Agents, not the models themselves, had the final say.

I quickly learned that, as a model, I lost agency over my own body during my first meeting with Bobby. After he offered to send me out to castings, Bobby quickly advised me to “keep clean” Sunday night through the workweek till Friday. He warned, “I don’t care what you do on your weekends but be sober and not bloated for Monday morning. You will not know too much in advance when you will have a casting, so be prepared.” This was the standard advice he offered to all his models, which served to set control parameters on his models’ behaviors. Even on my personal time, I was subject to Bobby’s gaze.

Bobby then continued with his spiel on work ethic and ground rules for his agent-model relationship. For example, I was directed to never alter my body or hair without first consulting him. I was to seek his consultation if I wanted to try a new hairstyle. In fact, Bobby specifically warned me to never color my hair. For added emphasis, he recounted the story of one model who he referred to as a plus-size version of Nicole Kidman with luscious red hair, who vacationed in Europe and, on a whim, bleached her hair blonde. “It was poorly done,” Bobby lamented, as he recalled having to call and explain to casting directors why the
promised redheaded bombshell was now a bleached blonde. As a consequence, the model lost work due to the lack of her signature hair color, and Bobby lost his share of the commission. In addition, his working relationship with these casting directors soured. According to Bobby, the model made the mistake of making both him and the agency look unprofessional. This model failed to abide by Bobby’s rules. She decided, without his consent, to change her look.

From Alex and her use of padding to Janice and her quick weight gain binge, these plus-size models labored over their bodies to appeal to their agents and potential clients. These plus-size models became products that clients fixed up and dressed up to present as desirable packages. Agents sold these manufactured packages to clients, who in turn resold them to consumers. These models were interchangeable bodies with dyeable hair and fixable features.