I went clothes shopping this weekend and it just never changes, it’s impossible to find any clothes that fit, and it’s not just me, I know a lot of women who have the same fucking problem.
I am a plus sized woman, but that does not mean that I wish to wear mummus with giant pastel flowers on them.
It does not mean that I am 9 feet tall. I can only seem to find pants that are for 9 feet women. I can pull them up over my boobs. Am I supposed to slap a belt on them and wear them as a jumpsuit ? Skirts are the same way, It’s supposed to reach up to me knees, but it turns into a ball gown on me.
Looking for petite sized clothes will not work either, because I’m far from petite. So, unless I’m looking for floods, I’m just out of luck.
Button up blouses might be a nice thing, but I will never know. Because either the buttons look like they are screaming on me or the shirts are so long they are dragging the ground behind me like a tail.
I must be the weirdo of the world, I’m sure there is an entire population of nine foot, mummu wearing, flower printed women in this world.
Not only plus-sizes. . . . Try finding flattering clothes for women over 40. The stores seem to have their “Britney Spears” collection and their “Golden Girls” collection, and nothing in between.
It’s gotten better, over the past twenty years or so, for the unusually sized male.
When I was a teenager, finding shirts with a 38" sleeve was all but impossible. The King-Size company had my sizes, but their idea of style was best described as “geek meets nerd” (button down shirts with patterns better suited to pyjamas – I remember seeing Robert Walker wearing one in Revenge of the Nerds!).
Today, I can find extra-tall shirts from a number of mainstream sources (Lands End and El El Frijoles, just to name two) which fit and which are not stylistic abombinations.
Perhaps the women’s clothiers will catch up one day.
Yeah you GUYS have the Big and Tall shops. We women of large stature and discerning tasts have… Lane Bryant and just TRY to find lingere that fits AND looks nice…
Yeah you GUYS have the Big and Tall shops. We women of large stature and discerning tastes have… Lane Bryant and just TRY to find lingere that fits AND looks nice…
I just want some gender equity. If Fashion decides that women should wear elf shoes with 5 inch heels, men should have to wear something equally uncomfortable. If it’s miniskirts and crop tops for women, men should find it equally hard to find anything flattering or practical.
dragongirl, I feel your pain. I think the designers behind women’s clothes must be trying to make women feel as shitty about themselves as possible. I’m about a size 12. I can sometimes fit into a 10, but usually wear a 12 or 14. Finding pants for me is like a special sort of torture reserved only for the especially evil. Either all they have are low-riders or they’ve got some gigantic pants that resemble pajamas with draw string waists. While I’m not opposed to draw strings (they’re quite comfortable on pajamas), they don’t do much for shape, particularly if you’re trying to play up what shape you do have. And I don’t think it’s really professional to come to work in pants where you could see ass crack if I bend over.
And the shirts! Give me a break. I really don’t want to wear the top half of a nightgown to work or skin-tight sweaters that make me look like a skank. I also am not interested in maternity wear, thank you.
I want to start my own country. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to eat my moo shoo pork and feel bad about myself.
You said it, dragongirl. I’m not “plus-sized”, but I’ve been trying to find maternity clothes that fit and look halfway decent.* It’s like designers freak out when they have to make clothes for bodies where the chest-waist-leg ratio is not that of a mannequin.
Coordinating leg and arm length, belly size, and chest size in multiple combinations seems to be an impossible task, so they default to small-medium-large and throw some measurements together and hope for the best. I honestly think they do it with a dartboard. The guy who made your 9-foot pants must have made a bullseye.
*Oh yeah, and I don’t want to spend $50 for pants ro a shirt for about 5 more months. That rules out a good chunk of the only somewhat decent looking items.
I’m not plus sized but I haven’t been able to purchase a tailored, button-up blouse in years. My boobs are too big. One of the gals in the office recommended Brooks Brothers today as a suggestion to locate a blouse that fits over my boobs without the button becoming a potentially lethal projectile.
I’m glad the wrap-style blouses are fashionable. They accentuate my tummy and waist and fit around my boobs. Occasionally, I have to wear a camisole or tank under them, but I still get the tailored look for which I’m aiming.
Where do women who get breast implants shop? I mean, seriously, my tits aren’t that big. I’m a 36D for cryin’ in the rain!
LilyoftheValley, may I humbly suggest Target and Gap Maternity? I don’t shop at Target for my clothing, but I purchased a few very nice (as in I could wear them to the office) maternity blouses from there when I was in the last few weeks of my preganancy.
Gap Maternity (only available online) had a number of items in the ten to twenty dollar range.
I so know the horrors whereof you speak! I occasionally check out Lane Bryant and have been stunned at some of the things I’ve found there. Low riders?! Are they insane?! In low riders and a belly shirt (yes, they sell those, too) I look like the love child of Britney Spears and the Michelin Tire Guy. And what’s with all these halter tops? I can’t go without a bra–ever. And those “convertable” bras that let you turn them into a halter bra are just a spinal injury waiting to happen.
I went shopping for clothes last week and it still smarts. (Bathing suit shopping, no less! Oh, my aching self esteem.) If I had only known that the uglyandinappropriate clothing thing was not just a passing phase, I could have made a mint as a clothing designer by just cranking out some NORMAL FREAKIN CLOTHES FOR REGULAR GODDAMN PEOPLE. NFCFRGP, I would call them.
Oh man I can really sympathize… I’m 6’ tall and I’m not model thin (I wear a size 18 in dress pants or example) and it’s insane shopping. To find me enough clothes I have to go to a mall and wander around htting all the sales of any place that has clothes that might remotely fit and try them all on.
Luckily I’ve been able to figure out a basic idea of where I can shop and can simply hit them because I know they are more likely to have my sizes.
About all we have up here is Tall Girl, where everything costs an arm and a leg (40 bucks for a plain green striped t-shirt?? I could probably go to Walmart and find something like it for 10 bucks. If they have my size is another matter) or is made for professional women. I’m a student yet, soon to be a mom. I am not ready for professional wear yet!
And don’t get me started on maternity wear. So far I’ve been lucky enough that I haven’t gotten that big and can still wear most of my fave clothes (which were a bit too big anyway from having lost weight, only now they fit closer than they have in about a year) but the majority of stuff I saw was for a lot shorter women. I was lucky though, maybe Lily if you have it there try Thyme Maternity. I found that they had a pretty good selection of nice and comfortable clothes for decent prices (45$C for pants, about 30$C for shirts unless you hit the back wall which had sale stuff for even less. It’s all good quality and I’ve taken to wearing some of it already despite not having to just because it’s comfortable stuff)
I am always surprised to see people complaining about Lane Bryant here, but then I wonder . . . are you talking about the store or the catalog? I have ordered lots of nice, non-slutty, plus-size stuff from the catalog, though I would agree that the store selection is pretty bad. I like the selection in both the Lane Bryant and Roaman’s catalogs, and prices are reasonable IMO (and I’m usually pretty broke!).
That’s funny…I wonder if the store selection at the Lane Bryant that I shop at is completely different. I always find lots of pretty, professional, non-slutty clothes there. I haven’t looked at the cataloge for about a year or so, but I have always found the selection in the catalog to be filled with overblown flowery things (read- MuMu) that I can’t stand, modeled by twiggy things that I could bench-press if I tried. In a word-YIKES. Way to go for the ol’ moralle…
Well, the catalog does have some of that gramma stuff, but I like the solid tops long enough to cover my ass, the loose gauzy summer tops, leggings, sweaters, etc. Pretty much basics, mostly in solid colors.
But yes, I do wish they would use plus-size models. Junonia does, but their stuff is too conservative and expen$ive for me.
I do not want Whinny the freaking Pooh on it either
Even though Opal is a lovely woman, I don’t want her on it either
Not all plus sized women are tall, I would like one tank top with straps that are not so long I have to tie them in knots to keep them up.
I do not want anything that a thinner woman would not wear outside like mumuu or really scary sweat suit outfits
I do want clothing they make for thinner women, IN MY SIZE, is it that hard to make the same clothing in a larger size?
when i can find the same clothing they make for thinner women in my size, I do not want to pay more than 10 dollars over what the smaller size costs, I am not so huge I am taking up yards and yards of cloth.
I find that the best-fitting clothes are the ones I make myself. It’s true. I know not everyone wants to sew, but it will save you a lot of money, and you will get clothes that are in your size, not “age inappropriate” (whatever age you might be) and they will FIT. (Of course, you’ll have to tweak the pattern to get it to fit perfectly, but that’s part of the process.)
A few years ago I made some dresses that actually FIT me. My goodness, how flattering they could be! I am not a thin woman, but when I am at about size 14/16 (I’m fatter than that now) I can look pretty decent in a dress that fits right. For me, most of the ready-to-wear clothes are too long, are too loose in the waist, and too tight in the bust/hips area. So I look like have no waistline or am pregnant or something. Not flattering.
It’s all in getting it to fit right. Any woman, no matter what her size, will look 100% if her clothes actually FIT. But God Forbid they make clothes that FIT us! We’ve got to make our own.
(Well, of course, there is Land’s End, which does have better fitting jeans and they will custom hem it for you. Next time I get jeans, I’m getting them from Land’s End.)
and just TRY to find lingere that fits AND looks nice…