I survived on coffee & cigs as a model, our size 0 obsession is dangerous… and back in full force, says Sophie Anderton
SEEING pictures from Paris Fashion Week recently, I felt my blood run cold.
The French capital showcased more than 100 designers and almost 5,000 looks.
Of those near-5,000 just THIRTY NINE were considered curve or plus-size.
From Chloe to Victoria Beckham and Yves Saint Laurent, designers unleashed hordes of heroin-chic skinny models back on the runway, in a cavalcade of pronounced thigh gaps and razor-sharp collarbones.
It was like the Nineties all over again.
As a model who shot to fame back then, I was in the thick of it all.
In between fronting a high-profile Wonderbra campaign for Gossard, and walking the runway for Vivienne Westwood and Ralph Lauren, I saw first-hand just how damaging the size-zero obsession was.
This was the decade of cigarettes and addiction.
Size 12 was plus-size, and girls quietly slid into anorexia and bulimia while agents turned a blind eye — until it became a problem.
Jodie Kidd recently spoke out about models of our era going to extreme lengths to stay thin, from eating cotton balls to taking speed.
It was a surprise to me — I never saw this, but girls were encouraged to be a size zero.
I was just 16 when I walked the Paris runways for the first time, my adrenaline pumping.
It was brilliant fun, but really, it’s no wonder these girls look exhausted — there was barely time to eat, not that you would even want to.
Surviving on a diet of coffee and cigarettes, I saw food as “bad”, and there was no information to tell me otherwise.
Size six with 34in hips, I was never going to fit into the heroin chic category and, of course, I was conscious and hyper-critical of my body.
I can vividly remember the hundreds of eyes following me on the catwalk, and to this day I won’t weigh myself, I can’t bear it.
I remember having a tape measure wrapped around my waist and being told by male agents to lose weight to stay the same size I was advertised as.
Nowadays, that would be seen as abuse, but back then, it was just part of the job.
If your card said you were a size zero, you had to measure a size zero.
It might sound cruel, but it was what we signed up for.
In 2009, I changed my priorities and my entire lifestyle. I threw myself into nutrition, health and fitness and found a proper balance.
I’m now 46 and while I’m still a size six, I’m mentally and physically healthier and have never been so happy with how I feel about myself.
Meanwhile, the fashion industry seemed to be on its own journey towards embracing body positivity.
In recent years, runaways became noticeably more diverse, with plus-size models like Paloma Elsesser and Ashley Graham fronting Vogue, and Valentino being praised a couple of years ago for sending UK size 10 and 12 models down the catwalk.
We’d come so far in learning to love our bodies — but now it seems all that progress could be undone.
I have three step-daughters and would be devastated if they looked at those pictures from Paris Fashion Week and believed they had to look like that, too.
I’m constantly asking them not to see women on social media and catwalk shows as the norm.
So many children today have body dysmorphia, because people are editing their own bodies into shapes impossible to achieve.
Stars like the Kardashians have suddenly lost their curves, while social media has been flooded with thigh gaps and jutting hip bones in low-rise jeans.
TikTok may have banned the hashtag #thinspo, but that doesn’t mean that content isn’t there under another name.
So how can we halt the full-blown return of size zero?
As well as enlisting more plus-size models, the industry needs to address models’ extreme schedules, and how they can manage their health.
I’d like to think that these days, agencies are not knowingly casting models with eating disorders, and that they would provide encouragement to seek support from medical professionals and nutritionists.
These girls are not cattle, they’re human beings, and they have a duty of care to give them the support and education they need about their bodies.
Take it from someone who lived through it — a return to ’90s thinness would be a disaster for both the fashion industry and girls across the country.
In this day and age, diversity should be a given on the catwalk, not a novelty.
It’s time to reset the clock to 2024 and celebrate every body, not just one.
