Opinion | Your Clothes Don’t Fit. Here’s Why. - The New York Times

I was 17 and trying and failing to find a plus-size dress for the prom. Wandering through shops with friends, I’d feign interest in the petite strapless and halter-top gowns before heading toward the rack, sequestered in a back corner, where they kept the dresses in my size. If you, too, were a “curvy” teenager, you’ll know the kind of frocks I found: predictably frumpy, with wide straps and high necklines, and available only in “slimming” black or navy blue. I was a vivacious teenager; the last thing I wanted to wear to prom was a funeral-appropriate smock. When I complained about this situation to my grandmother, who was also soft and round and no stranger to my predicament, she looked me square in the eye and said, “Let’s just make it, toots.” For a moment recently, it seemed that big brands and box stores were finally deigning to cater to women like me. The zeitgeist had evolved past the heroin-chic trend of the 1990s and the low-rise jeans of the 2000s. “Body positivity” became a

I was 17 and trying and failing to find a plus-size dress for the prom. Wandering through shops with friends, I’d feign interest in the petite strapless and halter-top gowns before heading toward the rack, sequestered in a back corner, where they kept the dresses in my size. If you, too, were a “curvy” teenager, you’ll know the kind of frocks I found: predictably frumpy, with wide straps and high necklines, and available only in “slimming” black or navy blue. I was a vivacious teenager; the last thing I wanted to wear to prom was a funeral-appropriate smock. When I complained about this situat