Zara - is this the shape women should aspire to be?

Parkrun manage to use size 8+ models and they look lovely.

Shein online store does this too. that's how I know some of their stuff will work on me. They are dirt cheap but I get so many compliments for their clothes because I buy things that short chubby women look good in on their website.

Just looked at Selfish Mother - that is ace.

@TanyaTonyaMargaret definitely. One shop I love for this is Selfish Mother/the family store (I never quite know which it goes by!) where rather than using models they post photos of an assortment of real people wearing their sweatshirts on sale with the size that person is wearing and their usual clothing size so you can see how they fit on someone the same size as yourself. Such a great idea I think.

Totally agree with OP that Pretty Little Thing needs a model who is right in the middle of healthy BMI not one under it and one over it.

To be fair to Zara it is a European brand - Spanish. You only have to look at southern European females and their shape is very different to us Northern Europeans. Their hips and boobs are generally smaller.

Perhaps look at the models of top shop or M&S to do a true comparison.

Anyway my point was, the brands are trying to flog clothes which is why they use fashion models: extremely tall with a certain bone structure (which gives the body shape, not the size), so we can all see how the clothes hang. If they used a mix of body shapes and sizes, the clothes wouldn't give a general look of the garment, and as fast fashion isn't tailored or particularly well made, won't look as good and therefore they'd get less orders.

Tanya what on earth...I can't get my head around your response to my post.
I was pointing out the absurdity of you using the word 'average' for your slim DD (not 'normal', 'average') whilst starting a thread to shame a model for being too thin, who is ironically, probably the same clothes size (an 8).

In terms of the title of this thread, I think women should 'aspire' to be whatever shape they naturally are when they are healthy - and this encompasses a wide range. I've been heartened of late seeing some companies with a wider range of body shapes as models (recently bought from modibodi and they have a great range of body shapes on display though they could do with a few older models too). Aspiring to be anything other than something in the realms of reality will only end in misery.

I'm short, I can't 'aspire' to be tall. I've also had two c-sections and I think only costly and invasive surgeries would get back the tummy of my pre-kid days but I don't care. I love my tum, it bears witness to having produced two beautiful actual humans! How amazing is that?

What strikes me about that model isn't so much that she's thin but that she also has boobs. Is this a common shape for young women now?
I don't have daughters so I may just be out of the loop but I was probably as thin as that model (and perfectly healthy) when I was a teenager but I was also totally flat chested and so were all my friends who were thin.

OP, take a look at JCrew. They are trying to do the very thing you’re talking about, although only on a few items at the moment. Hopefully they can role it out in the future.
www.jcrew.com/uk/p/womens_category/pants/slim/cameron-pant-in-ponte/J8065?color_name=heather-coal

You can see the trousers on 3 different sized models.

To be honest though, how you describe your daughter and how she’s very similar to her peers, don’t you think that’s more important than looking like a model? I always think being average weight and height brings its benefits.
For example a tall skinny girl in the real world, often can’t even find clothes to fit them. The 6ft women has very few places they can shop. Manufacturers make for the majority. Trust me, being different from your peers is much harder than being ‘average’ and not looking like a Zara model.

www.joyscribe.com/pretty-little-thing-now-showing-outfits-on-two-size-models/

Saw this earlier today.

Zara fits my tall, very slim DD and is one of the few places I can buy jeans that actually fit her.
She eats loads so no eating disorder (despite the school ringing me as they were worried).
I was the same at her age (but not quite so tall). However, I get your point as she is definitely slimmer and taller than most of her fiends

As a skinny teen, I compared myself to curvy celebs and models and felt inferior. Should we not have busty underwear models in case it offends flat chested, skinny girls.
You also can’t compare this slim, young model to your 6ft friends who I presume are much older?
She’s a model, she is not meant to represent all young girls. She just looks good in clothes. That’s her job.

The model looks lovely and healthy.
The dress is pretty hideous but hey ho.

Yes, women should aspire to be fit and healthy. Normal weight is a good thing to aspire to before anyone jumps in with anorexia comments.

Agree that body diversity would be a great thing to see. Women can be at a healthy weight and have very different frames and it'd be nice if it were reflected in promo shots.

I expected to click on the link and see a teeny tiny model but she looks fairly average to me and her boobs are bigger than I expected.

I do hate that style of dress - I think it looks good on very few people as it's so shapeless and the high neck is not great either.

That model is definitely a size 8 considering she's 5"9

if she was a size 6 she'd definitely look ill and malnourished.

those who are saying my daughters are size 6, I'm guessing they're pretty short and not 5"9?

if people saw me they'd guess I'm a size 6 but im actually an 8 but because I'm tall and have small bust I give an illusion that I'm smaller than I am.

don't forget catalogues are no longer allowed to use models who have an unhealthy BMI or they'll get fined.

Most high street clothes are made for people with small boobs. As a teenager I was stuck in size 16 tops even though I was a size 10 waist. Bravissimo clothes completely changed my life. I think clothes for larger chests are harder/more expensive to make so most high street stores don't bother.

ITA, onestep. Apart from the models, it's a challenge to find clothes that fit well if you're a perfectly healthy weight (nowhere near Evans type sizes) but with breasts or, heaven help you, arm muscles. Especially if you're petite.

sorry about the typos.

not rtft so apologise if I'm repeating ehat other havr said but I completely het why op is saying. most models are stick thin and straight up and down which is fine as long as they are not skeletal. However it is harder for a woman with an hourglass figure or just a different figure to he models to imagine what the clothing will look like on us when there's barely any representation online.
In an ideal world the same piece of clothing could be modelled by a skinnier model and also one who has a curvier figure,by that I mean hips and boobs but still a slim size as obviously there's already clothes geared towards plus size women.

Not really on topic but as I saw it recently, Jackie Green was surprised her clothes didn't fit properly anymore after having her boob job.

I don't think we should aspire to be a different shape to the one we are.

Dressing for your shape has lots of guides though. Trinny and Susannah did a whole series and book? about it.

I'm an hour glass. When I carry more weight, I'm just a bigger hour glass! You can't change your shape.