Spain: Restricting Clothing Sizes in Window Displays

Gosh, can we clone Spain?

I dont understand why they are no longer going to label larger sizes. Are they saying that it's not ok to be too small, but it IS ok to be too big? Sounds ridiculously PC and very one-sided to me. Well, I guess at least they're trying, unlike France.

I totally agree with the standardized sizes though, that's a very, very smart move and it'll make shopping so much easier for everyone (hopefully :-))

Caramelle-oh,
I read it as they are going to stop labeling size 46+ as "Large Sized (or "plus sizes)", not that they wouldn't provide a size lable for larger sizes.

Yes, that's how I read it too, Ashley, I just don't understand why they can't label the clothes as plus sized when that's what they are.

I just don't understand why they can't label the clothes as plus sized when that's what they are.

Maybe because the labeling is XXXL in the EU? Seriously, extra-extra-extra large? It's as bad on the other end too - a size 4 (UK...2 US) is XXS, extra-extra small?

Maybe it is better to just leave sizing in numbers...a 46 is equivalent to a US size 16....depending on height, that may or may not be bad - if you're tall it may be a bit overweight, but reasonable people can agree, it's certainly not outta the stratophere of extra-extra-extra large.

I wish they'd just do pants sizes for women like they do for men...inseam by waist size. Period, the end. Depending on the store, I can be a 2 to a 7 and that's just stupid. I don't want to have to try things on, I just want to get it and go!

/rant

For those of you who have ever been to Spain... you'll notice that Spaniards aren't particularly tall, and young Spaniards tend to be slim. And by slim I don't mean anorexic. My guess is what would be normal for Spanish women is sizes 34-38, 40-42 at most. Size 46 *is* "larger size" over there!

Living the the SF Bay area, we have a very diverse population with a huge range of sizes - from sub-zero Asian teenagers to supersized adults born and raised in the "land of plenty" decended from some of the biggest and best breeding stock the world has to offer. So tell me again, what's normal?

Regina W said:
a 46 is equivalent to a US size 16....depending on height, that may or may not be bad - if you're tall it may be a bit overweight, but reasonable people can agree, it's certainly not outta the stratophere of extra-extra-extra large.[...]

And I'm sure reasonable people can also agree that if you are a size sixteen it's quite possible that you could stand to lose a few inches (of course there will be exceptions). I know that people come in different shapes and sizes but we tend to exaggerate the natural range a bit too much(one person says "I know someone who doesn't have an ounce of fat on her and wears a sixteen" and then someone who is 5 foot tall and two foot wide thinks "well, it must ok that I wear a sixteen too")

It's thought that the recent 'fad' of eating disorders is caused in part by the constant reports about the obesity crisis, but that doesn't mean that we should stop worrying about obesity and concentrate on eating disorders instead, there needs to be a middle ground somewhere, and I don't think we'll get that by glossing over clothing sizes to make people feel better, that's just going to the other extreme.

Just have to add that yes, I do think they should still stick to numbers for sizing (as opposed to L, XL etc.), with 18 and over being labelled as 'plus-size'. Plus sizes in New Zealand are more expensive because more material is used, so it makes sense that they should be labelled as such so people know why they are paying more for the same style clothing.

Restricting sizes in window displays? Ridiculous. Standardizing sizes overall? Genius. It's confusing when I can wear a two at one store and barely squeeze into an eight at another.

I also think numbers are best. Small, medium, large... It depends on a lot of variables. Just because you have to wear a large, doesn't mean you're fat. However, saying that a 46 is not large, well... Sizes are being treated like an unstable currency. As people get bigger, the numbers have to be larger. But, since wearing a since 180 sounds crazy, we just drop it back down to 46. Just think that 50 years ago, a size 4 now would have been today's 8 or 10.

Finally, in response to Giselle's comment, which everyone keeps saying is so bad, I think she's right in a way. Having a strong family base and being brought up to believe in yourself and not be sucked in by the media is really important for developing self-esteem and self-confidence. When you consider girls living with anorexia, whether triggered by fashion and the media or not, the family should be the first group of people to intervene and help out. Also, family members often promote the idea that the only thing that matters is being skinny, and being pretty, and being the best at everything. Girls brought up by such hard-to-impress parents can have a really hard time accepting themselves even if they are fit, healthy, smart and beautiful.

Self-esteem comes from the self and not from an outside source. It is developed by taking on reasonable challenges and succeeding. Never argue your limitations, or they WILL be yours. Having a positive support system whether family or friends does make the path easier. By the way, Jonathan Winters said." Only the mediocre are always at their best." He was a funny guy!(Probably had a lot easier time finding well fitting clothes than ladies do. :-)

I'm a different Tara from the other one who posted. but i think this is all so ridiculous. sure a lot of women have eating disorders but a lot more people are obese or overweight (65% of americans) and i know this is about people in spain but people who are encouraging us in the US to adopt this policy of banning thin models and making our manequins/store displays larger are being really ridiculous.
by doing so you're telling people its wrong to be thin (obviously no one should be skeletal or emaciated) but that it is better to be larger. and in a country where over half the population is large and quite frankly very sick (being fat is as unhealthy and "bad" as having an eating disorder) we shouldn't be encourgaing people to be larger. we should worry about peoples health and make information/resources more available to people to help them live healthy lifestyles and not live in such excess.

Why not just call it like it is? If a larger size is a larger size, it should be labelled as such.

Sizing has gotten beyond ridiclous. I am 5 feet 11 inches tall, but am quite slim (by comparison to the average person these days, who is fat), and now have problems finding clothes that are small enough! Yet whenever I shop vintage, I'm *always* a 'large' or an 'extra large' - which is what a person of my height and frame should be!

It's ridiculous that should ever fit into a garment labelled 'small', yet the sizes keep on getting bigger, and being labelled smaller.

I have clothes from the fifties and sixties (bought in vintage shops) labelled 'large' and 'extra large' that are smaller than the 'extra small' you would buy in most shops today.

Yet people are unaware of how much bigger clothes now are. People think they have remained the same size because they're still buying a 'size 10', but the 'size 10' they buy now would have been a 'size 18' in 1970!

Get real. We need sizing based on inches/centimetres, and label a garment appropriately. I'm already finding it difficult enough to find clothes small enough - what does a woman nearly six feet tall have to do?

Do I have to get fat like the rest of the population just to find clothes that fit?

i think taking away the unappealing "plus size" moniker is a great idea (you know what size you are, is it really necessary to be told by an extra label, too?), and it makes total sense from a marketing point of view -buying clothes should make you feel good, not be a way of reproaching you, after all, your money is just as good whether you are a size 00 or a size 36. i think all clothes should come in all sizes - it amazes me when shops say they don't stock things in larger sizes because there isn't the demand, then the sale racks are collapsing under the weight of size 8s...

why does a size 8 have to be the "standard size" because i'm sorry, but wow. if they want to make it better, they should change it from like a size 0 to a 5, or something like that. because, no offense, but i think 90% of the population of north america has to exercise majorly, because as much as eating disorders are bad, SO IS OBESITY. i dont think it should be considered normal and alright to be fat (again, no offense) because it's not HEALTHY!

Candii, your view is distorted. Nobody at a size 8 is fat, not even if they are really short. I now doubt you "eat fast food all the time" and that you are "naturally thin".

I love the idea of making standard sizes on clothing. I hate the "XXS, XS, S..." labeling system because invariably all the clothes are shapeless and baggy, no matter which size you get. You can't look nice in clothes with no shape to them, I'm sorry. I would love it if they would size women's clothes with waist numbers and inseams and for shirts, go with the bust measurement. Do you have any idea of how much time that would save me when I'm shopping?

I also tend to agree that clothes nowdays are a lot larger. I had gotten some vintage 1960's dead stock from a friend of my mother's who had worked at Sears' back then. The shirts were a numbered size (I forget what it was), but the skirts were all a size 6 or so...and they fit me perfectly. In today's sizes, I'm a 0 or possibly a 2.

Why don't you think I eat fast food all the time? Put it this way. I go shopping usually atleast twice a week. Every time I go shopping I eat at McDonalds/Arbys/New York Fries, because its fast. We order out atleast once a week. And my daily exercise is the 30 min walk to my boyfriends house and 30 min walk home. Thats about it. When my mom was 17 she weighed 97lbs, and im 15 weighing 108lbs, I think im doing good. And on my dads side, no matter how much they eat they dont gain a lb. Its called a metabolism to die for on their side, and im lucky enough to get some of it.

Candii, because your posts have shown you still have quite a bit to go in your road to recovery. You may eat fast food, but the total amount of calories you are getting in over the course of a week must not be very high. You said it yourself, you have had an eating disorder. So it is not a naturally good metabolism, there is an underlying concern with your weight and with the food you eat.

I beleive it to be an insult when we use the terms plus-size and because women, especially women in their late twenties onwards, are naturally bigger than when they are 21 and especially if they have had children.

I have never had children and am an hour-glass shape and with beautful shapely body that is a size 16-18 in clothes. I have also been a size 12 but have issues with food anyway. What I can't get is that women who are meant to have hips and boobs are encouraged not to have and to be as flat and as long as you would expect a pubescent kid would be.

When I was 12-14, I was very skinny and long and lanky and that was natural. I got plumpy in my late teens and bulimic in my twenties when magazines and media told me it wasn't okay to be plump despite the stores being full of goodies. I then became a typical young adult and got into a size pair of 6 jeans after eating nothing for weeks on end or from bulimia. Now, I am eating all of the things I didn't in my first thirty years of life and all green and healthy but it is taking time for me to adapt to a whole food lifestyle.

I am positive and so sure that women of my age for example, are meant to be a size 14-16 and because that somehow feels right and natural. Anything under it, feels too skinny and not sure why and I cannot seem to accept that women is their thirties and forties can possibly be a size that you find 12-16 year old girls to be and they cannot all say it is because it is natural. It isn't and because they are under eating whether they eat healthy food or not.

I know that I can reach a size 12 if I want to, but that would make me feel like I am not meant to be 33. It is bizzarre but I see too many women who look far too thin for their age and ugly because of it. They assumme that being thin makes them appear attractive and it doesn't - it takes a lot more than that for many and some women look very old when they are skinny. I loved the days when women were larger and because they seemed more approachable and nicer.

I think that a woman should not be a plus anything if ahe is naturally meant to be a certain size anyway, but that she eats very healthily and excercises but not to the extreme society seems to demand of us to be. A size should be a one-size if it is made out of the same material and the rest just left up to what fits. I hate shopping as it makes me feel so huge and yet I am a pretty trim size 18 and don't have huge arms or bottom that others might have. Shape is what counts and not actual size if there is such a thing?.

There is no plus nor minus about bodies, they are just shapes and some with more weight than none. But I truly beleive that any extreme of weight is not nice and so we need to approach this subject differently.

Shikira, I agree with you. A lot of us are not built to be skinny, most of us even. After all, we have the genes of our ancestors, that survived famine. Stocky people passed their genes on more so than skinny people did.

While I understand the argument that plus-sizes use more materials, then why aren't designers giving a discount on size 0, then? They are saving there.

I think any healthy size is beautiful. So my view of beauty does not include most models, since they don't look healthy. Anyone who doesn't look starved, or slowed down by their weight, is my criteria.

Jan, if you want to know my caloric intake, it is, on average, 2000, and for my BMI and activity level and all that jazz, I should only be eating about 1400 calories per day (i've checked). Also, most of my food is at night right before I go to bed (can't help it, thats when I'm hungriest and I eat if im hungry. Or when im not..) so I should be gaining insane weight because you burn squat while sleeping.

Candii, those calorie calculators, in my experience, are always off. They say I should maintain at 1,600, but I can maintain at 2,600.

in addition to standardized clothing sizes, they should also look into clothing that is more durable and less ridiculous looking aimed at women. Something like mens clothing, the reason we have such hell shopping is because our clothing is too a.small/missized b.childish and c.naked. Men never need more than afew shirts at a time but women have entire closets of clothing thats practically worthless.

gosh, I hope its true:
SPAIN CARES!!!!!

Big deal, so you can eat more too. Doesn't mean im starving myself because I eat when i'm hungry and usually when i'm not because my friends are all insanely active guys with insane fast metabolism that never stop eating (Oh and they're a huge Italian family with someone cooking at all times lol) so..

No, my point is, the approximations are way off for many people, not just for me. So what you are eating is probably not above your maintainance, or you wouldn't be maintaining for starters. If you eat whenever you are hungry and don't eat just stupid "diet stuff" (like just salad and fruit, etc. - you know, the dumb crash diets) then you are eating enough, regardless of the calories. If you eat too few calories, your body will let you know by making you hungry again. It is simple enough.

Jan, Candii's only 15 right? At her age she can probably stuff herself fastfood every single day and not get fat. Naturally most teenagers are very skinny. I still remember when I was 15, I never thought about diets or losing weight, I just ate whatever I want whenever I was hungry. Despite that I only weighed 96lbs and 5'6 tall.

it was the transition into adulthood, that brought me over the 100lbs mark.

That is true, Meg. A lot of teens are naturally skinny. It is the growth spurts. I assumed she didn't eat as much as she claimed when in other topics, she talked about how a particularly underweight model looked healthy and said she'd had an ED and had been forced to gain weight.

yeah, I HAD an eating disorder in grades 7-beginning of 9. And so I think skinny is beautiful, it's simply my opinion, although every guy I know disagrees with me (you'd be surprised). Anyways I recently discovered another reason I was losing weight : my ex bf was making me seriously stressed (for a year). Ever since I got a new bf, i've been gaining a little weight (not much, like 3 lbs, but that was what I lost really fast with the old one). And now the old guy wants me back. Nope.

Candii, you are doing a fine job when it comes to romantic relationships. You have no idea how many times I have to tell my girlfriends, who are in their 30s, not to stay with or go back to guys who only put them down and stress them out. You are 15 and have that one figured out already, good for you.

candi,i instead of worrying about being fat, you need to start worrying about heart disease, diabetes, high blood sugar and cholesterol because other than gaining weight, those are side effects of eating fast food as well no matter how much you exercise and how fast your metabolism works.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6770514/

Hi,

I live in spain and i notice nearly everyone posted is uk or us. Spain has a very different standard of beauty, and those who said most young spanish are slim is incorrect, the majority of girls are what most would call a little over weight, they are size 44-46 as a spanish size 42 i know how awful myself and my friends have felt going into shops and finding only size 38-40. i myself can wear a 38 in carrefour, but require a 44 in Zara, this standardizing is desprately needed and if you saw the shop windows out here... they are size 0 or less, so honestly i think this is the best idea.

with that in mind, these girls are not un-happy, they are NOT fat. they are the right size, it is said, in spain, if you eat three healthy meals a day and snack on fruit when hungry, you will be the size god meant for you to be. be it a size 0 or a size 20.

also, putting a 46 shirt in plus sizes is grossly unfair when most people in spain are short with large boobs, this needs to be taken into account.

while i agree there parents should take care of their kids, we can't say fashion isn't to blame. read girls talk aimed at 7 year olds and it features size 0 models and diet fads, this is whats causing the problems.