Petite Salvation (of a sort) - the Rise of the Tween Shopper

I read this NY Times article, Tweens 'R' Shoppers, with a bizarre mix of pleasure/horror. Like every other business sector (computing/electronic companies probably realized this first), the apparel industry has realized that younger and younger children are having a greater influence over how their parents decide to spend their money. Armed with ready cash or credit card, kids are much more sophisticated and independent shoppers than in years past.

There has been an explosion of attention towards the growing tween market - older than little kids, younger than true teenagers; anywhere from age 8 to 12, depending on the definition. Part of it is caused by parents wanting to dress up their kids, part of it is kids wanting to dress like the fashion spreads. Either way, it's pushing down more choice and range into this demographic. One in which I'm essentially a member due to size.

I'm closer in shape to a tween than to an adult woman. You know the shape - less curve, but not no curve, and more straight lines than the average "fully developed" woman. It's often easier to find better fitting clothing shopping in the 10-12 year old middle school girls section - where I have found myself to be shorter than most of the 10 year olds.

At first blush, the increased selection just sounds like a fabulous windfall. How convenient! I, and every other sub 5'0" petite woman should just swoop into the nearest Abercrombie and call it a day. It'd even be cheaper than shopping in the more young adult audienced Abercrombie & Fitch! How cute we'd all look, how positively easier it'd be to shop, and how dressed to kill we'd be for that next middle school party!

So, of course, that's the catch: The clothes may fit better than everything else out there, but style-wise, it's doubtful that most of the garments could be used in more grown-up settings. Let's face facts: we're really just grateful freeloaders in this youthful age and size range. While we'll certainly get a wider variety of casual and basic clothing (you and your daughter can be twins!), the particular work apparel items that are most sensitive to fit problems (and difficult to find) will never exist for tweens.

But hey! At least it's something - right?

At 5'3" Even Professional Critical Shoppers Have Trouble

Zarah Crawford begins her NY Times Critical Shopper piece, Vintage Clothes With an Eye on Tomorrow, noting that "at just under 5-foot-3, with a body my mother describes as 'well covered,' I often find my love of high fashion to be a sadly one-sided affair." This statement, posted in an article just after NY Fashion Week concluded, highlights one of the problems that non-standard shaped people have with high fashion. If the shoe doesn't fit, my dear fellow Stepsister, you're just not Cinderella in Designerland.

What's worthy of note is that 5'3" is just an inch under average height for a woman in the United States. I personally have already written off designer wear because I'd have to perform radical and expensive surgery on the already expensive garments for things to fit - and potentially destroying the elements and proportions that make it notable to begin with. I mean, what can you do when the waist of the garment is at your hip bone? The very fact that a woman of average height and probably higher budget has the same problems makes it even more troubling. I mean I hate to ask again, but how tall do designers expect their clients to be to wear this stuff? 5'7"? 5'9"?

Crawford's review of Frock, seems generous and hopefully, particularly for a shorty like me. She starts by uttering the statement that I've become fond of when entering unknown stores: Do you have anything to fit me? The answer for her is yes! So it's no surprise that I'm anxious to try this place out.

The knowledgeable owners helped her find a few things that worked, and Crawford even purchased something that "fitted like it was made for [her]." At a full 5" height disadvantage to Crawford, I still intend to hit Frock up sometime this week to get my own impressions. Hopefully, the owners are as knowledgeable as she claims them to be. And after all, vintage is one of the suggested options for smaller and shorter people. And you know what? It's good that some benefit can come from our parents' and grandparents' nutritional woes!

A Question of Semantics - Our Favorite Dwarf Planet

Slightly behind the news cycle, this week's New York Times On Language essay by William Safire recapped the revocation of Pluto's planetary status because of its irregularity.

Pluto is now officially downgraded to a new category called dwarf planet, and all textbooks in all languages are ordered to refer to it with that adjectival derogation....The interest of language mavens in this astronomical rejiggering is the connotation of the words dwarf.... Dwarf, as both noun and adjective, means “shorter than the average for the species,” sometimes “malformed or disproportionate.” Because of cruel folklore portraying those affected by dwarfism as ugly Rumpelstiltskins, many with that genetic abnormality prefer to be called “little people” or “of short stature.” Midget, though well proportioned, is used to describe objects like tiny cars and submarines, and many little people take offense when the word is applied to them.

While he is certainly at least slightly tongue in cheek about the whole thing, Safire is nevertheless one of the few (maybe only?) well known writers that is actually taking notice of the incorrect and disparaging use of these terms in the public arena.

For a nation that is almost squeamishly politically correct on certain topics in both language and concept, America (and, mostly everywhere else too) remains quite blissfully ignorant of the problems of heightism and sizism. Writers don't question the inclusion of size (or lack thereof) as a point of either unflattering or irrelevant discussion.

Under the new rules, a planet must meet three criteria: it must orbit the Sun, it must be big enough for gravity to squash it into a round ball, and it must have cleared other things out of the way in its orbital neighborhood. The last of these criteria knocks out Pluto and Xena, which orbit among the icy wrecks of the Kuiper Belt, and Ceres, which is in the asteroid belt. Dwarf planets, on the other hand, need only orbit the Sun and be round. (emphasis added)

Taken from the NY Times again, the quote above neatly points out a not insignificant problem with the literal designation of a planet as a 'dwarf'. From this definition, it is clear as day that Pluto's problem isn't really size at all, but an entirely different requirement. Could it be that usage of the term 'dwarf' stems from a more insidious figurative implication?

Perhaps it comes from the assumption that the smallest humans are not supposed to have the force of will to forge ahead and clear out our own earthly paths. We need only gravitate towards, or just plain avoid, our larger and superior neighbors for survival. Our astronomers have seen fit to let us know that 'dwarf' refers not to a smaller body, but really, to a weaker spirit.

Petite Vindication in the NY Times!

A monumentous thing happened while I was in far away Providence land. A news story of particular interest to me hit the 'Most Emailed' list (and, as of this moment, is still #1) for the New York Times on Saturday. "Where's the Petite Department? Going the Way of the Petticoat" details the fazing out of petite clothing lines from high-end department stores. It was one of those "HAH! I told you so" moments when the article came sailing into my consciousness. I mean, if the New York Times is covering this particular snippet of fashion/business news, it's not exactly a tiny trend here. (find the full text here if above link doesn't work)

High-end department stores blame petite women for having such an "older, unfashionable and undesirable" image. And yet, it's hardly the fault of the short consumer to resign herself to this stuff if it's the only game in town. I've totally checked out the goods myself and find them...old, unfashionable, and undesireable. Hell, I'm sure even the older women that they're trying to target with such frumpy goods are going for the look either. Petite women who dress themselves from the petite selection can't help it - they don't really have alternatives besides going into the juniors department or spending horrendous amounts getting everything altered.

In Bloomingdale's at 59th and Lexington, I was in fact, directed to check out the selection in Tahari (definitely pricey, and definitely too long/tall). I guess they thought a young woman should know better than to be shopping in Petite's for God's sake! When I mentioned that things there were too long/tall/big/etc, the salespeople just kinda gave a shrug and said I can just get things altered. Just. As if it was completely beneath them to consider the hassle, cost, and general aggravation such a procedure would entail. Before moving to NYC, I figured that I'll find plenty of stuff that fits me in these expensive shops. Surely, if the clientele is most clearly willing to pay, they'd have stuff, I thought.

Wrong. Designer's in fact, do not "care about the little people." They want them, and apparently their fat wallets, to go to a land far far away. My brother (who is 5'5") and I (a stately 4'10") used to half-joke constantly about height discrimination. Being male, he certainly has it worse. Sure, everyone knows that Presidents and C-level executives are "supposed" to be tall and imposing. Ok, you can even posit that there's some slight edge to being taller there, but other components are also weighed in, so it's not completely about height. But it's a whole other thing when we're talking about selling clothes.

It's nothing short of discrimination (no, the pun was completely unintended). The most obvious sign is that the decision to slash the smaller sized departments is completely based on faulty irrational train of thought. The sales figures are in. Petite sales are growing, and high-end stores like Bloomingdale's do not want to service them! They do not want us rushing to their registers with willing dollars in hand. They do not want to revamp the 'image issue' that they themselves helped to create. They do not want us gushing to our friends and give them free advertising and loyalty just because they made us feel like everyone else. No, they don't want any of these things because in their minds, the decision has already been made. Because what good is our tenacious loyalty (albeit, we make up a smaller share) when customers like us make them cringe?

That's right, these stores have concluded that all petite women are old, frumpy and have no taste. Yes, disregard that petite just means short, for any age, income level, or any other socioeconomic index. Yes, disregard the fact that we're willing to pay more for the same thing if it fits because we know it's going to be produced in smaller batches and it's a pain in the ass to carry. Yes, disregard that you are educating your stores to redirect them to the "fashionable" sections of the store that they spend dollars in (and at their tailors). This judgement is hardly fair, as their sense of what we are is completely based on the clothing that they themselves decided to carry in the first place! And because they need to maintain a stylish and youthful image, these short rejects must be swiftly ejected from their stores before their presence taints the stores' name irredeemably.

These stores certainly have the clout and the volume to go back to their designers and distibutors and tell them to get their act together and to supply nicer and stylish clothes for the shorter set. It's certainly not a problem with short clients' unwillingness to spend. They've more than proven that since they are willing to shell out probably 20-50% more to get the regular-sized stuff altered. But, in the mind's of the decision makers, the decision has already been made.

At a very basic level, clothing is meant to make you feel safe and comfortable - both physically and emotionally. The trend-setters of the clothing industry has been doing a very shoddy job at both of these functions. I myself know that I would pay a lot more and be incredibly devoted to a company that would make me feel good about how I dress and how I shop. Instead, I quietly (well, not so quietly) suffer the indignities forced upon me by the way things are done. I am directed to children's departments. I am given the "sorry, but we really don't have a thing for you at all" talk from salespeople who are most definitely not sorry about it. I am told that I can pay a lot more to have the hems taken up, the seat yoke taken in, the darting move up, and the sleeves shortened for a shirt that will probably still look unflattering on me when it's done being dissected.

Indeed, the issue is not about indulgence or even convenience. It is completely about parity.