1. ‘More famous than Persil’
Ideologies of women
Looking over the history of models, the ideal weight significantly changes
and starts to develop an ideology that has impacted the younger generation
in an unhealthy way.
Starting in the 1950's, Marilyn Monroe, a beautifully curvy model had the
limelight. Flaunting her 'perfect imperfections' being proud of who she is
and the body she has. She set a positive outlook on body image saying: ‘to
all the girls that think you’re fat because you’re not a size zero, you’re the
beautiful one, it’s society who’s ugly.’ Obviously the idea of ‘perfect’
changes as society does and culture has diverted the idea of being
voluptuous is good to being stick thin is good.
Topshop, one of the most popular shops within the younger generation,
has recently been under fire with their use of tiny
framed mannequin models. At passing glances the
model looks like a skinny mannequin like any
other in any other clothing store. But to a young
girl with pressures of having the ‘perfect’ body
there are so many issues to point out; the fact that
the model is over 6ft like most catwalk models of
today, the skinny legs, bowed at the knees, ‘no
wider at the thigh than most women’s upper
arms’. The arms look weak and unnatural and the
waist is pinched in a bit too far. Young girls
would look and be envious of these body shapes,
fixate on the idea that being unnaturally skinny is
the correct way to look in this day and age.
The average size of a women’s waist is 33 inches.
The mannequins on displays in shops such as
Oasis, H&M and Zara range from 23 inches to
25.5 inches. Other shops such as Primark have
also been questioned about their concave
stomached and poignant ribcaged mannequins.
Natasha Devon points out ‘what used to be pear shaped with big boobs and
a shapely waist has evolved into something straight up and down’. The
2. 50’s marks the point in time where plastic surgery came into fashion,
however the ‘ideal body’
