My letter to the retail industry- A declaration of my Plus Size Curves

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Spending the last few weeks reading different blogs and talking it up with different people in the plus size retail industry, there were similar comments, frustrations, themes, and concerns that seemed to circulate repeatedly. With this, I thought that given a chance, I would address these all in one fell swoop, addressing these concerns to the retail industry as a whole. So, with that, I give you my letter to the retail industry:

Dear mass retailer, high fashion magazine, haute couture designer, mainstream
media, retail buyer, and all those who dare question my plus size existence,

I write you this letter to share my frustrations and concerns with you
and your antics! I write you as a plus size fashionista who is at her wits end
with the options, perceptions, and the constant snobbery that you relegate to us
fashionistas with curves!

How dare you presume that because we carry “more” in our bosoms, stomach, or behind that I should be ashamed! How dare you assume that all I want to wear are tents, muumuus, and nasty pasty florals! How dare to attempt to banish me to retail purgatory in the basements of all your department stores- next to the bathing suits at best! How dare you attempt to steal away from me any form of fashion!

What gives you the right to dictate to me what and how I should look! What gall you have to deny me the high fashion, red carpet worthy, extremely sophisticated looks as my straight sized sister! Moreover, you secretly yank my sizes out of your stores to dictate to me that I can only shop online!

How dare you send me on an expedition to excavate and dig for treasures of Plus Size Fashion? So what is this 5’8’’, size 16/18 fashionista to do when you retail buyers refuse to bring in any high- fashion, stigma shattering designers into your stores, only to attempt to blanketly “size up” your lines, minus the fashion? The nerve you
have!

I am a fashion snob, who will quickly drop my “pennies” on a Chloe satchel, don my Jimmy Choos, without a blink all the while reading the latest Vogue, Elle, and Marie Claire magazines- but to what avail? You call yourself doing a sexy at any size edition, attempting to include “us” in your readership, yet in the same read, you advocate plastic surgery, and massively Photoshop the curvy women who “grace” your editions. Why must we wait for these editions to be included? It only becomes condescending and patronizing.

Did you think that if you don’t cater to us that we would just shrivel up and disappear?

Well, let me tell you something. I am here along with the other 60% of women sporting a size 14+, and honey, we are not going anywhere! I am and have
always been a woman with curves. I have no shame about what I am working with. I love fashion! I like butt-hugging jeans. I am not afraid to show neither my arms nor my legs for that matter! I crave color, cut, and quality just as much as the next fashionista. I hunger for the latest “it” dress, shoes, or bag.

And guess what! I am loving and living life!

So this is my letter to you, retail industry. You can ignore me, shun me, and try your best to belittle me, but I am not going anywhere. I am here digging and searching and courting those who court me back. This Curvy Fashionista will be amongst those who make up this 73.3 billion dollar forecasted industry and spend our dollars with those who acknowledge and respect my curves! (Monif C., Qristyl Frazier, Igigi, Anna Scholz, etc.)