Mason Nicolette - Plus+: style inspiration for everyone

PLUS+ copyright 2019 by Ebury Publishing. Introduction Bethany Rutter. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of reprints in the context of reviews.

Andrews McMeel Publishing

a division of Andrews McMeel Universal

1130 Walnut Street, Kansas City, Missouri 64106

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First published by Ebury Publishing in 2018.

www.eburypublishing.co.uk

ISBN: 978- - 5248-5202-3

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018951478

Editor: Allison Adler

Art Director/Designer: Julie Barnes

Production Editor: Dave Shaw

Production Manager: Tamara Haus

Digital Production: Kristen Minter

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For every fat babe who ever inspired me.

Foreword by Nicolette Mason

Id love to pretend that I came out of the womb as this body positive, self-loving, confidently fat individual, but like most people who live in othered bodies, I was a self-conscious, self-doubting, chubby Middle Eastern girl who really wanted to be pretty. I was probably only 7-years-old when I became conscious of the fact that there was something wrong with the way I looked. I was desperate to fit into the mainstream norm of fashion and beauty, and so badly wanted to be cool, a universal feeling that felt even more exaggerated growing up in image-conscious LA. I spent my childhood and adolescence wanting to be thin, and literally squeezed my zaftig body into too-tight clothes just to play along.

When I was 16, my desperation took me to an ultra-posh boutique in Beverly Hills that had become the fashion destination among young Hollywood. I scanned the store for jersey and stretchy seams and little hints that something might fit, and zeroed in on a pair of sleek, faded jeans with a nary-in-sight elastic waistband. I clutched them and ran to the fitting room: These jeans were my ticket to being inducted into fashions exclusive club. I called my mom over, feeling so proud and confident, knowing how much shed love them too, only to be greeted by a hearty, belly-deep laugh. What? Dont they look good? I implored, while turning around and showing them off. My mom kept laughing, and motioned for one of the sales girls to come look at me peacocking in the jeans. Theyre maternity jeans, she giggled. Please, tell her theyre maternity jeans! The sales girl stood awkwardly, until she burst and joined my moms chorus of amusement. I scurried back into the fitting room, peeled off the jeans, and ran out of the boutique without looking up.

Even though I felt rejected by fashion, I was still obsessed with it; it wasnt just the maternity jeans incident it was constant micro-aggressions and the absence of anyone like me gracing the glossies. The pages of Vogue were plastered on my walls, and I fawned over Marc Jacobs and Anna Sui, fantasizing about what a perfect, designer-clad life might look like in a size 6 body. There was no Beth Ditto or Lizzo or Ashley Graham to serve as my fashion template. Whenever there was a body that looked like mine, it was understood whether blatantly said or through coded language that fatness was inherently bad. Fat was synonymous with ugliness, and if fashion was a world curated by aesthetics, which defined beauty, there was no way fat and fashion could coexist.

Even though I spent my entire life feeling hyper aware of my body and the space I took up, it took me years to self-identify as plus size, and even longer to find power in that identity. I was trained to shrink and obscure my frame, to disguise my shape and size through black, drapey clothing, and make myself as invisible as possible. Stripes? Not for me. Wearing white? It would only exaggerate my size. Patterns? Why would I want to draw even more attention to my ample ass? There were so many rules, all of them reinforcing the idea that fashion was not a world in which I was allowed to participate.

And yet, I found my way in. I was first introduced to body positivity in online Fatshion communities. That lead to creating my own blog, and then being invited to write for Vogue Italia , and then being a contributing editor at Marie Claire , and then creating collections for brands like ModCloth and Addition Elle, and then starring in international campaigns. There are so many and thens, and that journey lead me to this utterly transformative moment when I joined forces with my friend and fashion pioneer Gabi Gregg to create our own plus-size brand, Premme. Its a path that only became possible thanks to the labor of many people, especially women of color and queer femmes who created a language and vocabulary for body positivity, and acted as thought leaders and creators of our own empowering fashion. While we may not have been invited to the mainstream fashion table, theres something to be said for having to create our own damn party; its kind of a revolutionary act to adorn and dress ourselves, to look in the mirror and say, Damn, I look good, without an invitation from the establishment.

I could never have anticipated that fashion would finally reach a tipping point where it was understood, and even celebrated, that beauty exists outside the margins of the thin, white, eurocentric ideal. I only ever dreamed that diversity would become the standard and not just in a tokenizing way that truly reflected our world of different ethnicities, sizes and shapes, of different levels of ability, of an entire spectrum of gender identities and sexualities. Its a world where those same Vogue -approved designers, like Christian Siriano and Prabal Gurung and Clements Ribeiro, are making clothes for us. And where our models, our Ashley Grahams and Tess Hollidays and Candice Huffines and Precious Lees, are getting their own covers. To be part of a culture that is creating fashion and media for us, that is chipping away at the archaic ideal of beauty standards and style one hashtag at a time, is a literal dream come true.

Im so excited and proud of Bethany for creating this book, a physical book, and giving us a space to revel in our beauty, our visibility and our really damn good style. The power of visibility of seeing a mirror of ourselves reflected back to us, cannot be underestimated. It is in those mirrors where we can find our identities, our truths and our beauty. And if the world of fashion is still new and scary and feels unapproachable, please let this book act as the starting point and find us, join us and be your glorious, fat, fashionable self.

Introduction by Bethany Rutter

Weve come a long way, baby.

While Im under no impression that things are actively good or easy for plus-size women out there in the big bad world, our fashion universe has expanded more than I could possibly have imagined when I first started shopping for plus sizes. The amount of choice were presented with today is just astronomical by comparison, but still a fraction of whats available for women who arent plus size. This means we exist in a sweet spot: access to genuinely excellent fashion, but the pressure to be resourceful with it the pressure to bring out the best in whats available, the pressure to style pieces in ways that reflect our personalities because the pieces themselves arent quite right.