The recent withdrawal of Model Health Inqury‘s “ban size zero” request from London’s Fashion Week hasn’t abated support for the cause. In fact, many seasoned models have since vocalized their own tales of weight-loss terror and condemned the fashion industry’s pressure to be too thin.
Kate Moss, in an rare upcoming Interview magazine feature, speaks candidly of her peak modeling days, where often times her notoriously waifish figure appeared even too thin for her own liking:
“I didn’t eat for a long time. Not on purpose. You’d be on shoots with bad food or get on a plane and the food would be so disgusting you couldn’t eat it. You go to a show and there’s no food at all … I remember standing up in the bath one day and … I was so thin! I was never anorexic … I remember thinking, I don’t want to be this skinny.”
Along with many other media outlets, the Guardian has cottoned onto this story and points out that in addition to Moss, fellow veteran supermodel Karen Elson has also shared her own thoughts and experiences with keeping underweight to maintain status as a dominant model. In September’s UK Vogue, Elson says:
“Fashion is obsessed with finding young, beautiful and vulnerable girls, bringing them into the fashion world, praising them, worshipping them but suddenly dropping them like a stone when they hit puberty and grow boobs and hips. It’s so dangerous and can potentially harm the girls mentally and physically.”
She even admitted to occasionally abusing laxatives and experiencing bouts of bulimia as more severe aspects of her past weight restriction rituals.
The addition of Kate and Karen’s voices to the roar of protest against unrealistic weight expectations for models noticably made mainstream media headlines. But beyond increasing awareness for the cause, it remains to be seen whether industry veterans’ disapproval makes a measurable difference for the physically stressful lifestyles of the current crop of hyperthin catwalkers.
Will the advocation of healthier, more attainable weight standards by former modeling superstars help effect change in the industry? Or will canvassing efforts by a current top model make a deeper impact?
Are there any key figures in fashion that can individually advance the plight for healthier model standards or will it take the patience and strength of many?
