Model wears size 10

[beijingaling]

Do you ever read this^ and think WTF? better order size 16 then.

:o

No! but you made me smile.

Frequently. It's the main reason I look at the Isabella Oliver catalogue and think, 'Ah.... no.' And why I stopped buying from Boden around 2000. I have never seen a 'catalogue leg' in real life, let alone in my own mirror, and for that reason, I'm out.

(also when the model also 'thinks her dream job would be "candy floss taster/UN envoy/elephant doula"'? That also puts my credit card into rigor mortis, Johnnie, if you're reading.)

WTF is a catalog leg?

Just bought a dress from Dorothy P. Was going to order size 10 but I'm told that would give me the same figure as a flat chested tween so went with a 12 instead. I spent ages looking at the photo to see if it was pinned to fit too!

This is a classic 'catalogue leg', viz, impossibly long lean thigh, ideally with no cankle at the end of it.

white jeans are only friends with Catalogue Leg

also

on model, trendy skinnies; on human being, denim sausage casing

This is only my bitter, stumpy opinion, however.

ooooh yes catalog leg. I never buy trousers online as I know catalog leg is even less trusty than model wears size 10. I think, well that looks great on her ergo it will look shit on my stumps.

Biden must be the worst for it too. You never read reviews for their trousers were the purchaser is bigger than a size 10.

It's a shame, because if a size 16, 5ft 3in model with sausage normal legs looked fantastic in the clothes, we'd all flock to buy them.

Those girls would look fantastic in a sack.

God, am sick of the status we give skinny folk and the obsession with youth, firm (skinny, boy-like) flesh and "beauty". Don't get me wrong, I'm an attractive, average height/build/shape woman myself but, it's almost as if we it's seen as some kind of special achievement - like the rest of us who either cannot afford or would want (anyway!) cosmetic surgery are in some way not to be revered in the way the "beautiful" people are......

The following are genetic accidents... they haven't "ACHIEVED" beauty/attractiveness! It's what you're given in the gene pool!!!

George Clooney
Kate Moss
Naomi Campbell (who, if she was just a Joe Normal person would have been locked up by now!)
Models (at least the ones not starving themselves)
Halle Berry
Kate Middleton

Sorry, bit of a rant. Ignore me.

Loving the rant and agree!

Some of those people are (or seem) really nice though, ie they are liked because they seem friendly and funny and attractive in a personal way rather than just in terms of physical beauty.

George for example, and Kate Mid. I like them for being nice/clever/funny.

kate Moss comes across as not particularly friendly so I don't like her. And I don't think she is pretty any more. Though she used to be.

Agree Ingrid. George C is a beautiful thing and yes, can act and is by all accounts a man who does good/humanitarian works etc and looks damned fine whilst so doing!!

Kate Moss has NO talent. She looks hard as nails to me. I don't see the point.

I think it's counter-productive. I look at those images and think, wow, that model has really long thin legs... so those trousers can't possibly look like that on me. Whereas, if she had vaguely realistic legs, I'd look at the trousers and think, those trousers look great, I might buy them.

It's the same with short skirts on racehorse leggy models. It just makes me discount the whole outfit - even if I bought the skirt and it looked ok-ish, it would never look 'right' in my head, because I'd subconsciously be comparing it with what it looked like on the model when I chose it. Which is a bit ridiculous, because if I bought it off the rack without seeing it on the model first, who knows? I might be perfectly happy.

And - rant rant rant - what's the point of stocking a range up to size 22, if you only ever show the clothes on a size 8 model? I can actually remember the very early days of Boden, when the models were all Johnnie Boden's more attractive mates - they made a really big deal about it, until gradually the 'models' got thinner and thinner and more professional-looking...

Boden in particular annoys me, because they are aiming at a 35+ market (I would guess), but always show their clothes off on leggy 20 year old models.

Plus, nobody ever puts lengths of things like skirts and dresses.

I'm 5ft 3, and while I know that a short skirt on a 5ft 10 model will be longer on me, it would be nice to know whereabouts it would reach.

It wouldn't exactly be difficult to do. They'd get fewer rfeturns, too.

I like ASOS saying 'model is 5'10 and wears a size 8'. It's useful information.

Surely that first picture is photoshopped - I mean, obviously the model is very slim anyway, but it just looks weird, like her legs aren't attached/positioned in the normal way .

I'm not fat but somewhat sturdy of leg, and none of those jeans look like they'd go over my knees never mind any further...

My favourites are the ads for 'mother of the bride' outfits with peplums and big hats... which are always modelled on ridiculously leggy 25-year-olds.

kate Moss used to be beautiful when she was young - about 15-20ish. I remember being entranced by her

But then I saw an interview and she was the narkiest, least pleasant person in that interview, with a cruel laugh and just seemed to have no sense of genuine niceness about her, which was a really sad moment for me.

It could have been a dodgy snapshot and I'm sure she has a great side to her as well but it put me right off - her look seemed all about innocence and she clearly was lacking in that!

My fault for expecting her to be something, I suppose.

There are some catalogues where the models really put me off though - ones where they use their friends, and because they are real people, not the airbrushed icons we get most of the time, you can find yourself looking at them thinking 'she looks like she eats marmite and laughs too loud' or similar, and you get a bit distracted from the clothes.

Models have often to be neutral, without shape, without expression, or you lose sight of the clothes.

Plus if a model is wearing a size 16, I can't imagine the clothes on me, because I'm a 10.

So it's really hard for them to get it right.

having a picture of the item with no model can work quite well.

I know why they use thinner models in photos, but what I need to know if buying online is how it's likely to sit over norks and hips. Even a curvy size 8-10 would be helpful to see.

I am in favour of them telling me how tall people are, though. Expecially given that some shops think 'tall' starts at 5ft 6...

So what we need is a million models, some tall, some short, some fat, some thin, some curvy, some straight up and down, some with big norks and small waists, some with big hips and hardly any norks, etc etc

What sparked my OP was seeing a dress on Dorothy P and thinking yep, DP, size 10 fits dead on. I then noticed that the very flat chested model "wore a size 10" and I thought "there is no sodding way that a size 10 will fit my massive post baby norks me if it fits her in a size 10."

So now what do I do? Ordered a 12 in the end but I hope know it will be too big.

mippy for me you are bang on. As I said, I never order trousers online because I always think if they look good on the thin legged model they won't look good on me!

DP dress here btw... thoughts wise MNers?

have just realised that what I really want is for all catalogues to show all clothes on a model that has exactly the same proportions as me. [princess emoticon]

Oh dear. But I stand by Catalogue Leg.

Frankly? Yes, we do. High street clothes are for the wide range of people on the highstreet after all.