if there was any doubt to the fashion industry conspiracy...

[jackfaire]

It's generally accepted in the fashion industry that the models are just clothes hangers. No one, including the designers of these clothes, actually expect that someone will look like that in real life.

Which is why it boggles my mind that they expect anyone to buy those clothes I look around and rarely do I see anything that was designed by fashion designers and shown at those shows actually being worn by anyone.

[Gravekeeper]

Makes you wonder where the high end fashion industry generates its money from. Exclusively idiotic celebrities and socialites with too much cash on their hands?

Its certainly not the public at large. The general public would neither wear nor could afford 99% of the stuff that trots down the cat walk in the high end fashion world.

[blas87]

No kidding. Some of the trash magazines I get in the mail, there's sections of how to get the "look" for "less", yet the knock off or similar clothing is still more expensive than I'd ever pay.

Even in recent years, I haven't changed my style of jeans. I've been more open minded about looser fitting tops, but I'm still pretty hesitant with some of those styles.

I'll always be a low rise flare jean kinda gal, and I'll always love my long sleeved low cut tops with a cute lace cami tanktop underneath. Or in the summer, it's two tanktops or one really cute shirt, but I really don't care much for this revival of the 80s with skinny jeans and overly baggy tops that drape below the shoulders. Or the wild hair for that matter. I've been known to use the hot rollers for some volume or slight curls, but I prefer to keep my hair as stick straight as I can. And even though it's not as hot as it was a few years ago, the two tone hairstyle (two different colors) works great for me.

Another one of my favorite looks is a zip hoodie with a cute tank under it.

[Boozy]

I look around and rarely do I see anything that was designed by fashion designers and shown at those shows actually being worn by anyone.

Makes you wonder where the high end fashion industry generates its money from.

You guys are thinking of haute couture. Those lines are just artistic creations by big-name designers, made to look splashy at the shows during Fashion Week, and are solely meant to generate media buzz for the design house. Which is why "weird" is better.

They don't expect to sell any of those pieces to anyone. They are all handsewn, often by the designer themselves, and the pieces are made-to-order only. Sometimes they'll make a few of these pieces for certain celebrities for free, to create more buzz. Haute couture is the fashion industry's marketing department -- that's all.

Design houses actually make their money from their ready-to-wear lines, which you'll see on middle to upper class women all over the world. They'll often have lower-end lines too meant for the "aspirational middle-class." That's how they make their money. These clothes are far more functional and affordable. They retain only a handful of the haute couture line's features, such as the colour palette, or the assymetrical hemlines.

[Seshat]

It's generally accepted in the fashion industry that the models are just clothes hangers. No one, including the designers of these clothes, actually expect that someone will look like that in real life.

They use the ultra-thin (unhealthily thin) models specifically so that the lines of the clothes will not be affected by the lines of the woman beneath it.

This is also why many clothing lines don't make clothes for women larger than a certain size. If you're below about that size, it doesn't matter so much whether your natural body shape is pear, apple, inverted pear, hourglass or column*. The difference needed in clothing cut isn't so great that it'll make the garments hang particularly wrong.

I'm sure you've all experienced it, though. A garment that fits wonderfully at, say, the shoulders but is all wrong at the hips. Or vice versa.


Once you're my size, however, a garment designed for a pear looks awful on an inverted pear. One for an apple sags on an hourglass' waist, and one for an hourglass just doesn't fit an apple at all. And so on. The larger the woman, the greater the variations needed.

THEN add the fact that only one female body shape needs clothes that look good on a hanger: the column.
Clothes cut for a pear, apple, inverted pear or hourglass look like crap on a hanger. I've started to learn what kind of 'looks like crap' to look for, for my figure type (hourglass); but it takes effort. Most people just see a garment that looks ill-cut and move on to the one designed for a column-figure....



* pear: hippy
* apple: tummy-y
* invert pear: booby
* hourglass: hips & tits & a distinct waist
* column: sort-a straight up and down. Boyishly-athletic.