Monday, July 07, 2008

Dear "plus size" clothing makers,

Hi, How's it going? Uh huh, uh huh. Good. Hey, yeah, can we talk for a minute?
Here's the thing. It's July. You know what I like to wear in July? Dresses and shorts and t-shirts. You know what I like as well? Attractive colors. Good quality.
Maybe you guys could think of that once in a while. I don't want to wear black all year long. It's a 100 degrees outside. You may have forgotten this, but black absorbs heat. How about some lighter fabrics and attractive colors? 'Cause seriously, you're doing it wrong.
I know you don't care and won't listen. But, hey, just wanted to get it off my chest.


update: Hi to all from Shakespeare's Sister.
I'm so glad you guys liked my latest letter. ;-)
And all the fab comments are so spot on. Seriously. I could (and have) gone on for days about the people who design for "plus size" women. I'm going to write some more on this. Believe me. Thanks for coming by!

16 comments:

Bergie said...

and if they can have 2 for 1 sales in these vibrant colors with short sleeves that are at least 1/4 length and not (up my pit), it would be fantastic.

thanks for writing them!

Tobes said...

Wow I officially love this blog. May I just add a "PS: If you make clothes in misses sizes there is no reason you cannot simply have these cut for plus women as well... I'm tired of walking into Macy's and seeing miles of misses clothes in all styles and finding one closet in the back towards kids fashions and pajamas that house clothes for ME."

Your blog rocks
~Tobestalks.blogspot.com

maurinsky said...

I think a great opportunity exists here, to get some actual plus size women to design plus size clothes. I also have a hard time finding good summer clothes - aside from the dark colors and bad cuts, the material they use is often atrocious. I went to Lane Bryant for a summer dress, and almost everything was made out of unbreathable polyester. (I did find a nice dress in a breathable fabric...unfortunately, that was linen, so the dress wrinkles like mad.

Now I want to take a clothes designing/sewing class so I can learn to make clothes that work for the more zaftig woman.

Jezebella said...

Amen, sister. I recently wasted an entire afternoon looking for a lightweight summer dress in a color other than black. Preferably one that is good for travel (non-wrinkly, machine wash/dry). They don't exist! I live in Mississippi. I will not be wearing a black dress for at least five months out of the year.

GottabeMe said...

I heart you! And ask them to make sure, like on a real live plus size woman, that tank tops don't have gaping arm holes that show the entire side of your boob. And take into account that covering bra straps is important, and most of us plus size gals have significant bra straps.
And stop making clothes modeled after teepees. We're not all ashamed and dying to hide in a tent all the time.

Cola said...

Oh man, I hate cloths shopping.

Apparently my body is a small (depending on the store - some places I'm a large), but my chest is an extra large. I'm not particularly chesty, either. It just seems like everything I actually want to wear doesn't fit over my chest unless I also want it to hang off of me. My theory is that the models they use to determine sizes must not have breasts. =\

shayera said...

You guys! Totally welcome to my place.

Danny said...

I think a great opportunity exists here, to get some actual plus size women to design plus size clothes.

I'd be interested in seeing that happen so I can learn a thing or two and go do the same thing for plus sized guys. I figured shopping was aggrevating for plus sized women but I never new it was this aggrevating.

Anonymous said...

I'd also like to introduce these manufacturers to this miracle fabric called "cotton". It's cool and crisp and holds colour well, and if you put in a tiny bit of spandex, it doesn't wrinkle much. Imagine!

angiecita said...

can we also get them to understand that plus size clothes are not just larger versions of a size 2? Every time i go to the plus size section of a store that isn't Lane Bryant, i find that they've just made the smaller size larger, with no thought to the fact that a size 16 woman has hips and boobs and so that straight cut sheath dress isn't going to look good on anyone over 130 lbs.

Crissa said...

Gosh, and what I was always annoyed at was that everything always came in these terrible pastels. Look, pastels are nice, but not flattering if you're more of a warm color person.

I think it's like shoes or whatnot. It seems like they make clothes that only fit a few sizes, and that's fine, they won't ever try for other sizes. Like, they'll expand the waistline without making the clothes longer. Or shoes longer but not wider. Or longer arms or wider shoulders sometimes, just maybe?

Anonymous said...

Not to plug, but have you tried http://www.fashionbug.com? I just recently discovered them and was able to get some decent stuff that wasn't the same old from Lane Bryant...Even though I wasn't shopping for dresses, I did notice they had a wide variety of really cute cuts/colors.

Thanks for the letter! I totally agree!

Katie said...

I would like to second (or, like, fifteenth) the request for adorable clothes in fabrics that breathe. I would particularly like some built in bra (you know, real bras with cup sizes instead of that shelf bra bs) tanks in a nice cotton so that I can wear them plain. The built in bra tanks I have found have all been: a)made out of that horrid unbreathable and unflattering shapewear fabric, b)not available in my cupsize, or c)an XL that seems intended more for a size 12 than my size 16 self. My quest continues. In the meantime, I am gonna shamelessly plug this awesome plus size dressmaker I found on etsy: www.janebonbon.etsy.com

Anonymous said...

Here via a friend, and amen to all that has been said. I can only thank god for Maurice's, which is the first store I've run across in a long time to have decent clothing in reasonable cuts and fabrics for plus sizes.

My quest for a decent pair of pants that takes my giant ass into consideration is still ongoing, however. Lane Bryant's new approach to jeans is great, but they desperately need to extend that approach to the rest of their pants.

Anonymous said...

LB's new approach to jeans is only great if they have helpful salespersons to actually explain things to you. At the LB near me, no one would help me (they were too buys talking on their cell phones) so I took a dozen pair of jeans into the dressing room before I figured out what blue circles and red squares have to do with my butt size.

Anonymous said...

I'm big fan of designer style plus size clothing... I recently got lovely dress at reasonable price...