I read an article on salon.com about how some clothing stores are using mannequins with large busts. This is an example of one of the models available to retailers.
Personally, I don’t even look like the typical mannequin. Finding clothing that fits is extremely difficult.
I imagine a group of shadowy figures around a table in some office basement.
“Ladies and Gentlemen,” says a smooth, cultured voice. “We have American women supporting a diet industry, waxing every folicle of hair on their bodies, and injecting a bacteria toxin in their faces. What can we do now?”
Foundationally-supported. Once properly supported, that’s their shape, and the way for them to tell if clothes will fit them is to see them on mannequins (mannequines? mannequinnesses?) shaped they way they are with their undergarments in place.
Walking through Lincoln Park, I see more women shaped like the “well-endowed” model than the “normal” model. Breast implants are frighteningly common. It’s often the same women with money to burn who get implants, work out 8 times a week to keep the rest of them slim AND buy overpriced clothes. So it makes sense to me that those women in those stores would want to see their potential purchases on mannequins that are shaped like them. Much like I would rather see the clothes in Lane Bryant on real “plus size” mannequins, instead of the size 12 ones they use now.
If I were a clothing store owner, I wouldn’t want to stretch out the merchandise, just to cater to a small percentage of my customer base. But, if the waist and hips were in proportion to the boobs, it would be more realistic.
Do shoppers in general really pay all that much attention to mannequins? To the point of scrutinizing their size and proportions? I don’t. I’ll notice if there is a garment or outfit that I like on display, but I don’t take the size or shape of the display piece (i.e. mannequin) into account. I just try to find whatever it is I liked about the display in my size, then try it on to see if it is flattering. Not once, in 30+ years of shopping for my own clothes have ever I thought “Gee, that mannequin has smaller hips than I do, so that won’t look good one me.”
The only mannequins that ever caught my attention before were the ones with prominent, erect nipples. They didn’t affect my purchase of the clothes however, as I am a man. I think the main effect of mannequins like the one linked to would be to make men a lot more willing to go shopping with their wives/significant others. Not even strippers are built like that in my neck of the woods.
