FASHION: Deirdre McQuillan meets Louise MacCallum, a successful model specialising in big girls' blouses
"Models who are size eight are never going to be out of work, but things are beginning to change, and a lot more doors are opening for the plus-sizes." So says 24-year-old Louise MacCallum, a size-16 model who was recently on location in Ireland for this photo shoot for Claudia Stevens. "Photographers are getting interested in plus-size girls. Even Vogue is auditioning for bigger models. and you feel more accepted in the industry," she says.
A Londoner who cherished the idea of becoming a model as a teenager, "like many girls growing up", MacCallum was working in the finance department of MGM in Essex when a friend suggested she send photos of herself to a plus-size model agency called Excel Models in London. She was taken on immediately, quit her job "and everything suddenly took off". After just one month, she was hired for a photo shoot for Marks & Spencer and has never looked back. She has worked all over Europe and America, modelling for Claudia Stevens, Marina Rinaldi, Elena Miro, Evans and many others.
"I am naturally tall and curvy, and I don't think of myself as being bigger because my proportions are right. I am toned, I am healthy and I work out. I grew up accepting the way I am and never wanted to be anything different. What people don't realise is that it doesn't mean I am overweight, just heavier, and it works. Women who are curvy and voluptuous are absolutely beautiful," she says.
MacCallum originally intended to model part-time, but she is in such demand that it has left her no time for anything else. She loves the thrill, the travelling, working with "fantastic" photographers and the money.
Success also meant a move last April to New York, where she is represented by the Ford agency. "In the US, 60 per cent of women are plus sizes, and there is a huge market on this side of the Atlantic. Clothes in the past four years have got better and more companies are now adding a plus-size section to their collections."
When travelling, she wears jeans, a tank T-shirt and a cardigan. "I am a jeans and combats kind of girl and I love being comfortable." In London, she shops in Top Shop and H & M, because "their clothes are really funky", and in New York shops mostly in Abercrombie and the SoHo boutiques. The big problem, she says, is finding good jeans; she used to buy Earl, but says their sizing seems to have changed, so she tends to look in Gap, Abercrombie, even Top Shop.
In the UK, where 60 per cent of women are a size 14 or over, her message to manufacturers is that they should realise that apart from well-fitting denims, larger women want more seductive and alluring clothes. "Clothes for the plus-sizes should be a lot more sexy, especially evening wear," she says.
Sophie Dahl may have been the first modern model to make the bigger figure look glamorous, but the success of new generation models such as Louise MacCallum may slowly start to change established perceptions of beauty and body shapes in the fashion industry.
HOW TO ACT YOUR SIZE
Bigger girls make mistakes, says Louise MacCallum. "I see a lot of them trying to fit into smaller clothes and it just accentuates their size. Sometimes I buy things a size bigger so they hang better and I look slimmer. It's the same with tops; midriffs showing and bra straps too tight make a girl look lumpy. With a good fit, everything looks smoother and more flattering." And a plus-size woman, she adds, should never wear big stripes or patterns on top; little patterns are more flattering."