Oh, what’s in a number? When that number is a celebrity dress size – a lot.
Ashlee Simpson-Wentz has come out swinging against those in the media who have taken note of big sis Jessica Simpson’s fuller figure.
“How can we expect teenage girls to love and respect themselves in an environment where we criticize a size two figure?” Simpson-Wentz wrote on her MySpace Celebrity blog on Wednesday.
But she seems to be a little … off when it comes to gauging her sister’s current clothing size. A size two?!
Simpson is one of the many curvaceous stars who claim to be able to squeeze into the teeny size.
Kim Kardashian came under fire in September after telling OK! magazine that she’s a two – meaning she could swap clothes with svelte “Regis & Kelly” host Kelly Ripa and tiny Christina Aguilera.
And, of course actress Jennifer Love Hewitt famously used the petite size as a shield against critics of her bikini body declaring, “a size 2 is not fat!”
We think Love Hewitt (and the others mind, you) looks just fine – but they can’t all be a size 2.
“Clearly there’s a psychological piece to clothing size,” says Lynn Grefe, CEO of the National Eating Disorder Association. “Sadly, people believe that you are your size, that the size is a reflection of how good you are or how successful you are.”
Size is definitely a mental thing, agrees FIT professor and fashion designer George Simonton, but there’s no set manual with dimensions for “real” sizes – unless you consult the military.
“There are statistics with the U.S. government,” he says. “For strict measurements you have to go to the Army and Navy for [proper] bust, hip and waist measurements.”
But for non-military duds, sizes are open to interpretation.
“Each designer – believe it or not – fits a little different,” he says. “That’s why there’s always confusion with women.”
High-end designers tend to skew more toward “vanity sizes,” Simonton says, which run larger than, say, their T.J. Maxx counterparts.
Translation: A size two designer dress is more like a size four or six in a department store.
“A lot of women don’t really want to admit what their true sizes are,” he explains. “The only ones that do true sizes are J.C. Penney and Sears. They have certain measurements that their customers demand.”
Those who don’t get the size they want tend to “fib” about it, he says.
But understating one’s size can have negative repercussions for fans, says Grefe.
“For women and celebrities especially to be playing this game … it’s painful when I know people are dying to be these size zeros and twos,” she says.
Grefe adds: “I get disappointed that these women are doing [this]. Do they understand the implications? I don’t think that they do.”
(source)
