Do We Need a Super Plus Size? Silk Dresses:

 When the category of plus size model was first introduced around 1980, to bring style to the clothes of bigger women, no doubt the models were bigger than average, but in the twenty first century, with women having grown steadily bigger over the intervening years, plus size is now no more than average. The fashion industry has been reluctant to increase the size of plus size models, so is it time to consider introducing a super plus size to bring elegance and style to a new generation of big beautiful women? British Standard sizes for women's clothes were introduced in 1982. At that time the average woman was still about size 12, so plus size models wearing size 14 and 16 dresses could serve the fashion needs of the majority of above-average-size women. However, by 2010, the proportion of size 12 women had fallen to 31 percent and nearly 40 percent of women were reported to be size 16 or above. So plus size models of size 16 had come to represent the average woman, and large numbers of bigger women were again left without a category designation to inspire fashion designers to cater for their needs. Women's vital statistics have changed, but the fashion industry holds onto the Twiggy era of the 1960s, and its gesture towards bigger women is still stalled in the 1980s.