London Fashion Week

Mark Fast - Size zero Vs Curvy

Mark Fast's use of curvy models has sparked controversy, walk outs, creative differences and general conflict due to his show at London Fashion Week. Rather than using the norm slim models, Fast decided to take a stand and display his latest collection on size 12- 14 models.

I don't necessarily think its a wrong or right thing to do, normally thinner models are used to make the most of a garment, make it look even more beautiful. With long legs and a slim torso, its hard to make anything look bad. I think as a designer, Fast did take a huge risk, with using bigger models, his collection may not have revealed its whole potential, with audiences and critics attention drawn to the models, rather than the collection.

From this article (The Daily Mail, 21/09/09) it explains that this wasn't a rational decision, this was something Fast felt strongly about for a long time leading up to the show. It caused walk outs by Fast's staff, one of which was the stylist and creative designer.

I think Fast did something that he felt passionate about, and what he thought would improve and progress his designs. Surely as a designer passion is key and if you believe in something enough and as long as you can justify your ideas and concepts, you should go for it?

Or Fast did exactly what every designer wants to achieve, getting his collection noticed, a topical subject, with audiences arguing weather its good or bad. Well it certainly hit the head lines and has got people talking. Perhaps its not viewed as prestigious and glamorous as other shows at LFW, but it has drawn a crowd in favour of his actions, that feel something needed to be done about under weight models and it had shown that it does look good on bigger models.

I found this article interesting because I know when I was designing and planning my collection I had an image of 'the end product' including the models that would exhibit my collection and the over all styled look. I searched long and hard to try and get the models that I felt best represented the concept and style of the look my work was portraying. I personally think models are important, I designed and constructed for a certain size so the models had to be that size to do the garments justice.

Maybe I am viewing this as a menswear designer, I feel its perhaps easier to make women look as you want them to, with make up and hair. With men its harder to make them look uniform.