How does a full figure feel?

JUST LOOKING: Trudie Cain wants to know how fuller figured women feel about the clothes they wear.

The Massey University Albany PhD student in sociology says that apart from a handful of chain stores, there is little choice of affordable fashion available for larger women.

“The media says we’ve got an obesity epidemic so you would expect to see a lot of people cashing in but there’s not that much.”

From the people she has interviewed so far Ms Cain has found that ‘uniforms’ are prevalent among larger women.

These consist of mainly jeans, dark pants and box-shaped, dark shirts which are worn in an attempt to ‘hide the figure’, but in fact have the opposite effect, she says.

Some people do not even want to shop, with one woman saying she doesn’t really think about clothes.

“She thinks about it more than she realises. She set herself up so she doesn’t have to think about it, but she’s angry that there’s not enough available,” Ms Cain says.

But not everyone is confined to the ‘uniform’.

“There was a bit of resistance, one woman took her whole wardrobe to a personal consultant who told her how to best wear her clothes,” she says.

“It made her feel more confident,” Ms Cain says.

“There was this shift from the baggy to the realising that you can wear things to make you feel better about yourself.

“That’s what I’m interested in, how clothing makes you feel about yourself.

“One woman wanted to be able to reveal her body and see herself as a sexy woman and resist the stereotype for how bigger women are ‘supposed to be.’”

Ms Cain says she found this interesting because of negative attention larger people get from society through TV programmes such as Downsize Me and The Biggest Loser.

She says the response she has received through her research is wonderful, with women unashamedly opening up to her.

Each person is required to keep a journal on their experiences with clothing throughout the day, to take pictures of the clothes in ‘their world’, take part in a group discussion and have Ms Cain accompany them on a clothes shopping trip.

She says she wants to publish her findings with entertaining stories and possibly an art installation to provide a voice in the community for larger women.

Ms Cain is looking for more size 18-plus women to include in her research.

By MICHELLE LOTTER

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