Fashion World Makes Room for Big Models

They are big and they’re beautiful. They’re called “large and lovelies” by the modeling trade and they have the same occupational hazards as their long and lean counterparts--having to wear furs for an outdoor shoot in the summer, juggling bookings and maintaining a shoe wardrobe that would make Imelda Marcos blush.

But large-sized models have the added difficulty of appearing fashionable in a Size 16 evening gown. Their livelihood depends on pouring 200 pounds into stylish clothes and at the same time appearing every bit as poised on the runway as their svelte Size 6 co-workers.

Every indication is that they are succeeding in not only looking stylish but changing the public’s attitudes about large women.

“It used to be that if you were over Size 12 you were considered a cow and that was that,” says Carole Shaw, editor of BBW: Big Beautiful Woman, a national magazine based in Beverly Hills that caters to sizes 16 and up.

“Large-size modeling is truly in its infancy,” Shaw says. “In 1979 when we started, there was no such thing. We used to get our models by going up to large women in the street and asking if they would like to model. The industry just didn’t exist.”

Fashion coordinators, models and agents all attribute the boom in large-size modeling to fashion designers, who in the past few years have begun creating high-fashion clothing for large sizes, lending respectability to Sizes 12 and up .

“I think it’s just really developed into something of importance over the last few years,” says Susan Lane of the Susan Lane modeling agency in Santa Ana, which represents many large-size models as well as average-size and petites. “Before it had always been played down or joked at. Now it’s a serious business because the demand for large sizes has grown and the large-size clothing has become much more fashionable.”

And Stacey Machin, a 27-year-old Mission Viejo model represented by the Susan Lane agency, said: “It’s just starting to boom right now as far as becoming big time. I think it will be as big a field as for the thinner models, because (so many) women in America are overweight and they need women to represent them.”

Still, it’s been an upward climb to respectability in a society that treasures the long and the leggy.

“Unfortunately, oftentimes we aren’t getting the respect for that category from the population that does not buy large sizes,” Lane said. “(Clients) may still say, ‘Oh, you have fat women as well,’ and of course we prefer not to think of it that way. “

It’s not just clients who have wrestled with the notion of large women modeling fashionable clothes. Some large models have trouble with the idea as well.

“Many full sizes stand up and say they like to be full size, but I personally would like to be thinner,” says Machin, who weighs 150 pounds and wears a Size 13-14. She says if she were smaller she would be able to work in television.

“My gripe is that if you have a really good face, it shouldn’t matter how much you weigh,” Machin says.

“There is a real call for larger models,” says Beverly Eckert of Beverly Eckert Productions, an Irvine company that produces fashion shows. “But many of (the models) feel insecure about their weight and don’t stay in it long.”

“I still encourage those who want to lose the weight to do so,” says Lane, who adds that clients generally want large models between Sizes 12 and 16. “I don’t try to keep them in a larger size than what they’re comfortable with. Although it’s very hard for a large-size model when she goes below a Size 12. If they are in between, neither market will have a need for them.”

Leslie Hunt, a busy model who lives in Mission Viejo and is represented by the Cunningham Agency in Los Angeles, says that although she is not trying to lose weight, most big models are.

“I’d say that nine out of 10 are unhappy with their weight,” Hunt says. “It’s not an easy business to be in anyway, even if you are small, tall or thin.

“(But) I don’t care, I’m going to maintain my weight no matter what,” says the Size 16 model, who is also a saleswoman at the Forgotten Woman store in Newport Beach’s Fashion Island. The Forgotten Woman carries high fashion for large sizes. “If I were grossly obese I’d do something about it, but I’m healthy. . . . I don’t want to be working on my weight my whole life.”

Really, though. Isn’t trailing a string bean on the runway a tough act to follow?

“Sometimes I see a girl’s legs and think, ‘Why couldn’t I have legs like that?’ ” said Hunt, whose 5-foot-7-inch frame holds 196 pounds. “I don’t have legs, I have pillars.”

If working alongside skinny models is sometimes disheartening, the response from the audience is anything but.

“They always bring down the house,” says Eckert of the larger models.

“I think the people in the audience really enjoy seeing the larger models in the shows,” said Costa Mesa resident Kelli Weiffenbach, a Size 16 model who weighs 195 pounds. “I didn’t expect that . . . to have them burst into applause to see someone who wasn’t a stick.”

“The response I get when I’m on the runway is enthusiastic,” Hunt agreed. “It’s like the audience is saying, it’s so nice to see someone my size in beautiful clothes. I don’t feel like I’m the token fat girl.”

More of a challenge has been finding stylish clothes. Until recently, large-size clothes were stuck behind the potted palms next to the ladies’ room. They were found in departments with matronly names such as Women’s World or Queen Size.

“In department stores, you’ll still find polyester pants that attach to the cellulite in your legs,” jokes Hunt. “The large sizes have to be re-educated that they can find stylish clothes; they don’t have to wear the ugly ones.”

Shaw at BBW agrees.

“We have seen a bloodless revolution in the large sizes,” says the Size 22 editor. “You’d have to be an opium addict to call fashionable what they used to pass off. They finally realized that large-sized women don’t like ugly clothes. I can buy a blouse at K mart for $10 or a blouse at the Forgotten Woman for $350. And that’s great because that’s the variety the small sizes have.”

Shaw says 30% of the adult female population wears Size 16 and over, constituting a $12-billion-a-year clothing industry.

“When it’s all said and done, you can’t tell the fat dollars from the thin dollars,” she says.