What would be considered a fat size in UK?

I think it's safe to say though that Liz Hurley has serious, serious, weight issues.  This is the woman who didn't leave the house when pregnant. 

Yeah, I heard about that Mindy. But it still really pisses me off. That skinny cow needs to get a clue and understand what kind of impact that sort of flip comment can have on people far less cyncial and b*tchy than I am!! 

OK.  But what about comments about skinny people?  Is that really fair?  Are you not doing hte same thing in reverse?

Course I am! 

Seriously, though. You are right. I think, though, that because the media and so many women are so obsessed with being thin (let's clarify - thinner than EVER before), it's hard for me to be sympathetic to people who want to look like that and kill themselves to do it. Both extremes are bad. I know I'm overweight, but I also think I have a pretty healthy body image and would never ever want to be that thin. I'd be thrilled to be a US 14 which is why Hurley's comment ticks me off so much.

Claim:   Marilyn Monroe wore a size 16 dress.
Status:   Not exactly.

Origins:   The  fascination with this "fact" about Marilyn Monroe's dress size is not its literal truthfulness per se, but the implication it carries: that our standards of feminine pulchritude have become so extreme that the woman who has been idolized as the world's premier sex symbol for half a century would be considered "chunky" or even "fat" by modern standards. (Conversely, some of today's celebrities seem to be fond of invoking the "fact" that Marilyn wore a size 16 dress as a means of asserting that they themselves are, if not thin, in better shape than the renowned Marilyn Monroe was.) Marilyn may (at times) have been a little heavier than today's ultra-svelte models, but the notion that she was "fat" (even by today's standards) is based on misinformation or misunderstanding.

The claim about Marilyn's dress size is difficult to prove or disprove, both because of a lack of information and because of the number of ambiguities it engenders:


Like most women, Marilyn Monroe experienced weight fluctuations as she aged, became pregnant, and  went through cycles of weight gain and dieting, and so she would not have worn any one dress size, but a range of different dress sizes.

The standards for women's dress sizes have not remained constant over the years; they have changed as the size and shape of the average woman has changed. (Clothing manufacturers assume most women don't want to wear clothing of a size identified as "Large," for example, so they adjust their sizing so that the average-sized woman takes a "Medium." If the size of the average woman has increased a bit over the years, then the very same size that was a "Large" fifty years ago might be a "Medium" today. This is sort of what has happened to women's dress sizes since the 1940s: a woman who weighs more now than she did twenty years ago might actually be wearing a smaller dress size today.)

A person's overall physical contours can't necessarily be determined from a piece of his clothing. A very tall and skinny man might have to buy pants with a waist size larger than he needed in order to get the correct length of inseam, for example, and therefore inferences about his weight based solely on the waist size of his pants would probably be inaccurate. Likewise, a woman whose bust, waist, or hip measurements were unusually large or small (such as a woman with an acclaimed "hourglass" figure) might have to buy a size of dress that was not reflective of her "overall" size. (Even examining the clothing Marilyn wore in her heyday wouldn't necessarily answer the question about her dress size, since her outfits were custom-made by studio dressmakers and therefore didn't bear size tags or hew to standard industry dimensions.)

Reliable documentary evidence is tough to come by for this sort of thing. Doctors might record a patient's height and weight, but not her dress size or measurements; other citings of Ms. Monroe's size are difficult to take at face value, as their sources (e.g., studio publicity shops) are known more for exaggeration and puffery than accuracy. Additionally, weight and other size measurements are mere snapshots: a mature person's height is unlikely to change significantly, but the other numbers can vary quite a bit over time.
So, what can we say with any certainty? We can at least establish a range of measurements for Marilyn Monroe based on the available sources:

Height: 5 feet, 5½ inches
Weight: 118-140 pounds
Bust:  35-37 inches
Waist:  22-23 inches
Hips:  35-36 inches
Bra size: 36D


A woman of Marilyn's height, at the extreme of Marilyn's weight range (140 lbs), would probably wear a size 12 dress today (which is the same dress size listed for Marilyn in the book The Unabridged Marilyn). Perhaps at one time she did wear dresses that might have been considered size 16 (or even 18) back in the 1950s, but she almost certainly did not wear dresses equivalent to today's size 16.

(source: http://www.snopes.com/movies/actors/mmdress.htm, a site about urban legends)

I don't really know if there is a fat size. I know someone who wears size 18 and she looks about 12/14 but because of her body shape that's the size that fits her. I'm a size 12 bottom and 14 top because of my shape but again people don't think i look that size. It all depends. I don't reall think there is an answer to that question.

Lucy

That's pretty cool, Carla. Thanks!

Unfortunately, that also just makes me even madder at ol' Liz. So Marilyn was NOT even a US 14 (let alone 16 or 18) and Liz *still* thought she was 'fat'. 

I have 2 words for that: puh leeze!!
 

There definitely is reverse discrimination.  My mom was a size 2-4 back when I was a teen.  She didn't starve herself or even exercise.  She was just naturally a skinny woman.  People would always ask if she was anorexic or starving herself.  She really wanted to be more muscular or curvy like me.  Hah!  And I wanted to be skinny like her.  I'm quite sure that most people think someone else's body is the best. 

There definitely is reverse discrimination.  My mom was a size 2-4 back when I was a teen.  She didn't starve herself or even exercise.  She was just naturally a skinny woman.  People would always ask if she was anorexic or starving herself.  She really wanted to be more muscular or curvy like me.  Hah!  And I wanted to be skinny like her.  I'm quite sure that most people think someone else's body is the best. 

I was thinking the same thing about my best friend reading this post.

We grew up together and she is very petite.  At 5'2, she's a size 0-2 and sometimes has a hard time finding clothes in the misses section, and has to look in juniors.  That's particular a problem for her career clothes.

I always felt big and fat around her and she wishes she had curves like me. 

My dear friend doesn't diet or starve herself and can really put down the food.  She's just programmed that way and wishes that she wasn't. 

I definitley agree with the reverse discrimination. I hope I wasn't coming across as someone who really does that.  All the women on my Dad's side of the family are teeny tiny. I am a total Amazon when around them at my thinnest. Now I just am thankful I don't see them much (for other more important reasons, too but that's another post!) because I'd feel like Everest next to them.

That said, though for the most part they are naturally petite, they are also very discriminatory of those who aren't as well as making themselves pretty miserable trying to stay super petite. Food and enjoyment are mutually exclusinve terms in their lives.

Guess no one's every really happy and I think that's a pretty sad thing about our society.

BTW, it's also very cultural. I remember seeing an Oprah or something where a very thin black girl wore multiple layers of clothes to give herself a more *padded* appearance. She wanted the 'big ol' butt and boobs' that so many black men are said to prefer...

Recently I went to FCUK and wouldnt be able to get one leg or boob into anything they had in that entire store!

I couldn't wear their stuff when I came here and was a UK size 10 on top and 8 on bottom, Pebbles, so don't feel badly!  Their clothes are NOT made for women w/boobs, and mine were only 36C at the time.  They're deffo not made for anyone with the slightest hint of muscle tone in their thighs or calves, and as a former dancer, my calves didn't fit into their jean at all, despite being as fit and trim as I've ever been in my life.

I just walk right past it these days - don't think they offer a maternity clothing line  .

Topshop size 10 trousers were tight on me back then as well.  And that was before I'd even had kids! 

Another shop I don't bother going into anymore.

It may interest you all to know that a few weeks ago, the magazine Drapers Record, sort of a trade magazine for the garment trade, had an article on how there was a big oportunity out there for someone to supply the "bigger" market in the UK, both for women and for kids, especially for kids apparently. This was so interesting to me that I investigated importing the larger sizes of "blank" clothing from Dharma trading, thinking of painting, dying, and printing on them. Unfortunately, they don't send outside the US, darn it. Anybody know of an EU source for larger clothing blanks?

DJC

There definitely is reverse discrimination.  My mom was a size 2-4 back when I was a teen.  She didn't starve herself or even exercise.  She was just naturally a skinny woman.  People would always ask if she was anorexic or starving herself.  She really wanted to be more muscular or curvy like me.  Hah!  And I wanted to be skinny like her.  I'm quite sure that most people think someone else's body is the best. 

My mom experienced the same thing, tiger.  She has always been a naturally slim woman.  She still is, although now she wears a US size6 in her sixties.  She jokes that she has 'frumped' out.  But during the 50s when she was a teen, it was more fashionable to have the hips and boobs she never had.  I used to admire her lean legs - she had those thighs that could wear drainpipe jeans and pedal pushers - and she'd say, 'Oh, I wish I'd done dance and had curvy, muscular thighs.' 

My mom experienced the same thing, tiger.  She has always been a naturally slim woman.  She still is, although now she wears a US size6 in her sixties.  She jokes that she has 'frumped' out.  But during the 50s when she was a teen, it was more fashionable to have the hips and boobs she never had.  I used to admire her lean legs - she had those thighs that could wear drainpipe jeans and pedal pushers - and she'd say, 'Oh, I wish I'd done dance and had curvy, muscular thighs.' 

Very interesting.

I have a lovely coffee table styled book called Sunkissed - Sunwear and the Hollywood Beauty 1930-1950.  The book celebrates beachwear from that era and is loaded with fab photographs of women of the day.  Needless to say, most of them are vivacious and curvey, just like what your mother said was fashionable then.

When I got the book, my hubby skimmed through and jokingly told me "It looks like you missed your era."       Image has certainly changed.

I think it's most important to just be happy, healthy and yourself, wherever you may fall on the scale.   I was an overweight child and have battled with my weight my whole life.  It's not easy.

DJC, there is a HUGE market in my opinion, for larger sizes. The options here are pretty limited and don't take into consideration different body shapes (fat is not a body shape!) and I find most of the stuff cheaply made and overpriced. And one thing you'll have a really hard time finding is any maternity clothes over a UK size 20. I have no idea where plus size pregnant women shop here.