Rare: a winter boot that delivers on its promise to keep you warm and safe from deceptively lagoon-like slush puddles. Rarer still: a winter boot that can accomplish the former with style and aplomb — and without a rubber upper that's reminiscent of a duckbill.
It might seem like a fool's errand, but after years of searching, we're pleased to announce that we've found one brand that really can do both: Aquatalia, which combines distinctive Italian design with innovative weatherproof technology to make seriously exceptional shoes. Ahead, we're sharing some of our favorite styles from the house's holiday 2020 collection, which range in vibe from a lug-sole stomper trimmed in shearling (just like your beloved aviator jacket) to a sparkly sock boot that's dying for a feet-on-desk Zoom moment, to an off-white, mid-calf model that's very "go-go for 2020."
Anyone who’s ever been asked to be a bridesmaid knows that the honor is not without its pain points, especially when it comes to picking out a dress for the occasion. For starters, there’s the tradition of making every bridesmaid wear the same dress, which inevitably ends with a handful of bridal party members wearing a color that doesn’t suit them or a silhouette that doesn’t work for their body. Dresses also tend to be expensive, yet they are often purchased with the intention of wearing them one time and one time only. But while the process isn’t easy for anyone involved, shopping for a bridesmaid dress when you’re plus-size is all the more difficult. Due to the bridal industry’s long-standing ignorance toward their sartorial needs, plus-size women are far too often forced to endure painful shopping experiences.
Given that bridesmaids are there to serve the bride and make her life leading up to the wedding calmer, rather than more stressful, the issues around plus-size dresses have long been swept under the rug, with bridesmaids often hiding their frustration, anger, and insecurities in order to spare their loved one’s feelings. But, according to Sharon Feliciano, a two-time bridesmaid from Seattle, WA, rarely can the frustration go unnoticed by the bride. Despite trying to hide her discomfort throughout the dress-selection process at her first wedding as a bridesmaid, the bride, her sister-in-law, saw it written all over her face. “I think shopping for a bridesmaid’s dress is stressful for everybody — it’s stressful for the bride and it’s stressful for straight-sized people,” Feliciano tells Refinery29. “But there’s an extra layer of stress and anxiety that comes along when you don’t know if [the store is] going to have a size that you can try on.”
During her first experience in a bridal party, Feliciano was the only bridesmaid who was plus-size. According to her, she was also the only bridesmaid to experience disrespect from sales associates, who pressured her into trying on sizes far too small and far too big because the store — a popular bridal chain — didn’t stock her size in-person; and the only one to spend the wedding in an ill-fitting dress. “By the time it was all said and done, I felt beautiful,” she says. “But a lot of that had to do with the bride and feeling like a cherished part of her team and welcoming her into my family. Having her make me feel that way really helped to soften the pain of being a bigger body trying to shop in a store full of smaller bodies and dresses made for smaller bodies.”
“No one should have to alter themselves to feel good in their skin on a day when they want to feel confident for both themselves and the friend they are supporting during a momentous occasion.”
Alessandra Gonzalez
Alessandra Gonzalez, a makeup artist living in New Jersey, had a similar experience to Feliciano’s. “I’ve been a bridesmaid twice now, and each time was equally frustrating in its own right,” she tells Refinery29. Gonzalez, too, visited a chain bridal retailer first, because she believed it was her best bet for finding dresses of all styles for all sizes. “I was definitely wrong.”
Like Feliciano, she, too, was made to try on dresses that were too small and too large, making it so she couldn’t get an idea of what any of the styles would look like after alterations. “You’re a 20, but we have a 16, so just try it,” she recalls the associate saying to her. “‘I know my body, and it’s just not going to pull up over me. Please stop bringing me these sizes,’ I told them, but nothing. And then the other option was a size 24, which they could get on and clip up, but it gave no impression of what the dress would look like in my actual size.” Once the dress was chosen, she had to go through rounds of alterations — at her own expense — only to end up with a dress she didn’t feel confident in. “It was disheartening, to say the least,” she says.
A second attempt at being a bridesmaid brought Gonzalez to a luxury store that advertised plus-sizes on their website. “Thinking this would be a different scenario, I was very excited to go and try on dresses,” she says. “Upon my arrival, though, that feeling quickly left.” There, she recalls being greeted by associates who scoffed at her for asking for a size they didn’t have in-stock while politely serving her straight-sized friends. “I am a size 18 — a very common size in the plus-size world — so I can only imagine how much harder it is to shop there in an even bigger body,” she says. In the end, she left feeling “dissatisfied”: “I went on to purchase a $300 dress that needed $200 worth of alterations because I had to order it without trying it on and was unable to view it on a plus-size model.”
The experience didn’t just take a toll on her financially. “I spent the next nine months dieting extremely and exercising excessively in order to not to hate myself in comparison to my friends in the wedding pictures,” Gonzalez says. “No one should have to alter themselves to feel good in their skin on a day when they want to feel confident for both themselves and the friend they are supporting during a momentous occasion.” According to Chelsea Kronengold, the Communications Manager at the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA), shopping for a bridesmaid dress can be particularly triggering for women who wear larger sizes. “Bridesmaids dresses notoriously run small, and the price often increases after a certain size,” Kronengold tells Refinery29. “When everyone is wearing the same dress, it’s understandable that comparisons may occur among bridesmaids.”
“Having the choice of trying on a size 14 or a 22 when you’re actually an 18 is not good enough.”
Caitlin Scanlon
Four-time bridesmaid Caitlin Scanlon tells Refinery29 that having the freedom to choose her own dress — keeping to black was the only requirement from three of the four brides she served as a bridesmaid for — makes all the difference. “I had more flexibility than some other bridesmaids are afforded,” she says. During Feliciano’s second bridesmaid experience, she, too, had a better experience when she found out she could choose her own dress. According to her, in addition to dresses, bridesmaids were given the option to rent a tux, opt for a jumpsuit in the same color as the dress options, or add a sleeve or capelet if they wanted to conceal their arms. “The part of the experience that made shopping as a plus-sized person feel a lot more comfortable was having many more options to choose from,” she says.
Even with the added flexibility, though, neither Scanlon nor Feliciano were immune to the industry’s lack of options for people who wear larger sizes, which, in the U.S., is 67% of all women. “The dresses available in plus sizes still leave a lot to be desired,” Scanlon says. “Forget about seeing it on in the color you need. You’re forced to use your imagination and rely on blind faith that the dress will look right in your size and color. Both of these factors come together to create what amounts to a guessing game.”
I’m researching bridesmaid dresses, and so many “big name” bridal shops have sad excuses for plus size dresses. I want my family to look and feel beautiful in my wedding, but Fashion says they don’t get to. I hate y’all. Make bigger clothes.
As some commenters were quick to point out, leaving someone out because of their size, no matter the added time it may take to find a dress that works for their body, is fat-shaming. That said, as others pointed out, brands should be held responsible for making dress option in a size 16 and larger. Feliciano adds that brands should also be offering as many sizes in-store as are offered online, so that women can enter any location knowing that there will be something that fits them no matter what size they are, rather than being forced to fit into a smaller or larger size. “Having the choice of trying on a size 14 or a 22 when you’re actually an 18 is not good enough,” says Scanlon.
Show real people with fat bodies in your advertising. I want to see how a dress is going to look on me — not just a very tall woman who is a little big-boned, curvy, and is a plus-size model.
Sharon Feliciano
This should extend to campaigns, too. “Show real people with fat bodies in your advertising,” Feliciano adds. “I want to see how a dress is going to look on me — not just a very tall woman who is a little big-boned, curvy, and is a plus-size model. I still have yet to see somebody, who’s got a little bit of a belly roll showing through their bridesmaid dress in advertising, and that’s just reality.”
Gonzalez urges bridesmaid shops to not only carry every dress in every size, but to also “make the slight adjustments necessary to turn a straight-size dress into a plus-size one,” rather than just adding more fabric. This process — called size or pattern grading — occurs when a designer creates a sample, which is then used as a reference to “grade” the sizes above and below. Issues arise during the process when brands don’t account for different body shapes.
Sure, more bridal brands are offering extended sizes in bridal than ever before — BHLDN recently launched a plus bridesmaid category, as did Birdy Grey and Lulus — but it’s still bleak, with few options available to plus-size bridesmaids.
“When you have fat people in your life, you’re going to face situations like these,” Feliciano says. “Brands need to make it so that the onus is not on the bride to make sure her bridesmaids don’t feel terrible about their shopping experience.” That’s the job of the brand, not the bride — and especially not her bridesmaids.
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When I came out as queer, my sense of style changed dramatically. Not just the individual pieces, but also the way I bought them, wore them, and presented my sexuality in them. Before coming out, I associated queerness with something to hide, so I wore clothes fit for that purpose. Straight cuts with dark colors and little flair were my comfort. But once I’d embraced my identity and discovered queer fashion icons and art communities, I began to sport bold shades. I became attracted to loud prints and interesting shapes. Take it from someone who only used fashion as armor to conceal my body before owning my queerness: Clothes are a declaration of the self. A statement of identity I went from burying to wearing proudly.
I am not alone in feeling this way. “Clothes have been an integral part of my queer awakening,” Ben Pechey, a non-binary fashion critic, tells Refinery29. “They are the conduit of how I identify, bolstering me against the outside world. I find this comforting when navigating a world that rarely understands queer people.”
Perhaps making up for lost years in the proverbial closet — when I bought plain, figure-concealing pieces I told myself were “fat-hiding” and “straight-passing” from the high street — I’m a much more considerate consumer now, while also being experimental and unafraid with my style. When I shop, I deliberate. I ask myself if the pieces belong in my wardrobe, or on me. The words, “Do you have this in black?” rarely leave my mouth anymore. I want the exaggerated. The extravagant. The tongue-in-cheek. There’s no better way to summon my own strength than by wearing camp clothing. When you’ve been through struggles with identity, it seems all the more important to present yourself in a way that feels celebratory.
In a research article titled “Clothes Maketh the Queer? Dress, Appearance, and the Construction of [LGBTQ+] Identities,” fashion and identity academic Victoria Clarke writes, “Dress and appearance constitute a primary way of creating a sense of identity and community, separate from the dominant culture, resisting normative, gendered expectations.” This describes the empowerment I feel from wearing camp clothing perfectly.
And, when you’re plus-size like me, dressing in a way that feels representative of your identity becomes even more difficult.
The rise of fat positivity in the last few years has ensured a long-needed boom in plus-size clothing production. According to research by Statista, the U.S. plus-size apparel market was estimated to be worth $9.8 billion as of 2019, up from $9.7 billion the year before. It is now outperforming the rest of the fashion industry. More and more brands are signing up to offer the diversity we deserve. However, most plus-size options still seriously lack style variety — unless shapeless sacks with butterfly prints are your thing. Additionally, pieces that represent the uniqueness of being a queer person are few and far between, and that’s why many queer fashion lovers have been taking the matter into their own hands and turning to queer-run clothing swaps.
Back in 2015, I was invited to a queer-run charity clothes swap. As a plus-size shopper who has worn shapeless black clothes for most of my life — partly because of the lack of options, partly because I was still wearing a lot of black — I attended to show support but carried little hope for what I would come away with. At the time, I was part of a vibrant gay community, surrounded by camp fashion often acquired on the high street — something I felt left out of due to my larger size. Yet, at my first-ever clothes swap, where communities (typically local) swap their pre-loved clothes for the pre-loved items of other attendees, I found myself pleasantly surprised.
The sense of freedom felt at this clothing swap is hard to replicate in any other fashion space. The simplicity of browsing garments, free of judgment and anxiety, is something no plus-size, queer person takes for granted. This swap shop was specifically run by fat, LGBTQ+ folk, the kind of fashion event I didn’t know existed. (Since then, I have found more.) When you try on clothes in a store, everything works against you, from the price tag to the awkwardly-placed, confrontational mirrors. But at a clothes swap, you’re surrounded by other fat, queer people in the same position as you — you’re just a bunch of people building wardrobes together. The free element of clothing swaps also means freedom, as the lack of cash involved meant I could be more experimental. When you have nothing to lose, you can be brave with your outfit selection.
For the first time, my size and sexual orientation didn’t matter when shopping for clothes, an invaluable experience that changed my outlook on fashion. I left with an overflowing bin bag stuffed with new clothes, including a zebra-print oversized dad shirt, a pair of not-so-sensible heels, and a glittered mesh T-shirt, pieces I never thought my body would wear.
Katrin, a plus-size queer designer, runs clothing swaps in Edinburgh. Like me, Katrin found the joy of swapping clothes with other fat girls to be an experience that changed not only her wardrobe but her entire outlook on fashion. Like many plus-size women, she grew up feeling jealous of thin friends who would lend pieces to each other for night’s out, and it wasn’t until university that she found a plus-size friend to do this with. “For the first time, I experienced looking through someone else’s closet for outfits. It felt amazing to share that with someone,” she says.
Discovering the joy that clothes swaps bring, Katrin began organizing private swaps in her community. “I realized that other people could probably benefit from clothes swaps the way I have, so I set up a Facebook group and began organizing larger events for queer, plus-size people.” Prior to the pandemic, the group-run event met up regularly to browse each other’s pieces and trade.
After experiencing the diversity of items and the vibrant community spirit, Katrin rarely shops new now. She also notes the environmental benefits: “In a world of fast fashion, it’s great to be able to give pieces a second or third home. It’s also very budget-friendly, an exciting way to receive new clothes without paying for them.”
TJ, a queer artist from Belfast, seconds the latter, calling clothing swaps “a space where you find something you have wanted, or to try on an item you might normally find inaccessible.” Having attended other plus-size focused, queer-run clothes swaps over the years, TJ found them a safe solution to style exploration without the fear of financial commitment.
Part of TJ’s love for clothes swaps comes from their non-binary identity. “A huge part of my gender expression is tied to the clothing I wear as a non-binary person. Clothes have a massive impact on my confidence,” TJ shares. “I wanted to create something that would allow others to play and explore and discover what makes them feel the most at home in their own bodies.” More recently, TJ wanted to help those who’ve been affected by COVID-19, providing affordable clothing and a source of community-driven entertainment, by launching a socially distanced clothes swap event within their art collective, the 343
Since then, they have organized safe and secure drop-off and pick-up days. After the drop-off, clothes are left untouched for a few weeks and then the bags and surfaces are cleaned before being transferred to an unused area. Moving forward, they’ll be photographing items and publishing them online, and then responding to people’s claims for them.
TJ doesn’t expect the usual process for clothes swaps will resume until 2021. As such, they will continue to adapt the swap according to the government guidelines throughout the pandemic. However, they believe the spirit still carries. “For a year that has been so isolating and lonely, the queers around me still strive to keep our community supportive,” TJ shares. “The community closet clothes swap is only an extension of that.”
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वर्कआउट मूव शेयर करने से लेकर हेल्दी एंड फिट रहने तक मलाइका अरोड़ा अक्सर अपने सोशल मीडिया हैंडल से फैंस को मोटीवेट करने का कोई मौका नहीं छोड़तीं। यही नहीं, एक्ट्रेस खुद भी कभी अपनी फिटनेस रूटीन को मिस नहीं करतीं।
