November 13, 2004

"It's a little sexist. It's not creating an image of a woman as an elegant creature. It's a little bit down and dirty, a little crass."

The "voluptuous" new mannequins have 38" hips and actually wear a size 8. Should we be offended at the loss of "elegance," like the executive quoted above, whose company manufactures the "Twiggy mannequin," which is tall and wears a size 2 or 4? The voluptuous mannequin -- called the Goddess! -- ends up selling a lot of clothes, because the clothes (especially jeans) look good on the mannequin and then look good on the customer. Who hasn't wasted time trying on something that looked great on the mannequin (or the hanger) and then been horrified at how it looked on? If you go to all the trouble to try something on and it looks the same on you as it looked on display, you're extremely likely to buy it.

And then there are the men: "Men like it. Some guys come in and buy the mannequins."

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