Fast fashion line Joe Fresh recently announced its size expansion to a women’s 22. While this is great and all, they STILL have yet to embrace ALL SHAPES AND SIZES. ALL would include petites and petite pluses. Yes, petite as in SHORT. I know that everyone says short people can easily get things altered, but as I’ve said time and time again (in other blogs), NOT EVERYTHING CAN! Shocker, huh?
It’s not surprising that people are unaware. Many don’t face it themselves and many who DO don’t seem to care. I, for one, hate to look sloppy, but I also don’t always want to wear skirts and pants with a top tucked in. I also have a straight body type with a longer rib cage in proportion to the rest of me, so I often look boxy and matronly when things are tucked in. In other words, if I want to look somewhat professional (in a business casual kind of way), I’ll need a top that isn’t too long (but not too short, either) – ideally, around hip length. Unfortunately, tops marketed at hip length are usually long on people with my body type/proportions – UNLESS THEY’RE MARKETED AS PETITE. Cropped tops, of course, are too short/not professional looking. So what are we to do? Look matronly? I hope not. Wear dresses? That’s limiting, isn’t it? What if we want to wear pants? Or skirts? Clothing brands’ marketing departments/marketing people really need to take that into consideration. And if you’re going to say you’re catering to ALL body types, you have to MEAN IT!
At the same time, however, size expansion IS a start at becoming more inclusive. It IS very difficult for larger women to find clothes that fit them – harder than us standard sized petites. However, I WOULD like to see more brands acknowledge that shorter women of all shapes and sizes ALSO have unique size issues. And I also wish that people would stop shaming people who are small (but that’s something else entirely). Oh well, maybe another season…(not that the addition of petites would get the same kind of press as plus)
