Clothing
sizes changed over past decades; labels
deceptive
By
Sara Chinchilla
Online Forty-Niner
Contributing Writer
In the irrational world of women’s clothing, size is a vague concept. Manufacturers
and designers all have their own very different, very individual sizing rules.
One designer’s size 4 may be bigger than another’s size 12 and visa
versa, another’s large is minuscule in comparison. All over the country,
women dread trying on clothes, finding they no longer fit into the size 6 they
had once been able to. Designers play mind-games as they label clothes to their
liking, destroying the shopping experience for hundreds of women.
In pre-industrial times, women made clothes at home or had them made by professional
tailors or dressmakers who would take individual measurements of every single
customer. During World War II, the demand for military uniforms compelled the
garment industry to change the way clothes were made and, in order to meet the
high demand, standard sizes were introduced, allowing the industry to mass produce
ready-to-wear military uniforms.
This sparked a revolution. The clothing industry moved to create size standards
for women. At the request of the Mail Order Association of America (MOAA), the
U.S. Department of Agriculture conducted a comprehensive study of womens’ measurements,
creating a standard. Major department stores like Sears and Roebuck and Montgomery
Ward quickly picked up on this commercial standard and began labeling their mass-produced
products. Women now had a convenient and affordable way to obtain up-to-date
fashion items that could easily be replaced as styles changed.
As the once coveted hourglass body-shape began to vanish, manufacturers and designers
discovered the advantage of appealing to womens’ vanity.
Each began to create his or her own unique and subjective sizing system, creating
bigger clothes labeled with smaller sizes. Women found themselves wearing smaller
sizes as their
bodies continued to change.
Finally, in 1983 the Department of Commerce withdrew the official standard for
womens’ clothing. The clothing market became saturated with a diversity
of sizing standards. Sizes continued to vary from designer to designer and now
they even vary within the same company. It was a free for all.
Today, more than ever, the vanity sizing effects designers and manufacturers
created is more apparent. The average woman is no longer 5 feet 2 inches and
129 pounds; today she is about 5 feet 8 inches and weighs about 144 pounds. Clothes
are still made based on the assumption that women’s bodies are hourglass
in nature when, in fact, women are now more pear-shaped, with hips wider than
their shoulders.
Designers continue to strive to make their customers feel good, in hopes that
if they feel good they will spend more. They label their clothes to make sure
that when women shop they pick up clothes at least one size smaller than their
actual size knowing that will make them happy.
Designers make sure women are not faced with one of their worst nightmares, having
to whisper to the sales
clerk, “It doesn’t fit, do you have this in a bigger size.”
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