Behold the ideal of masculine beauty...so says Hedi Slimane (formerly of Dior Homme)...oh, and the rest of the world too.
My friend Mark sent me this article from the New York Times today.
He didn't comment on it, just sent it. (I'm not sure how to interpret that.
But let me not dwell on veiled or unveiled insults....or try not to. Ironically enough, he actually fits this "ideal.")
Here are some choice quotes from the article:
Wasn’t it just a short time ago that the industry was up in arms about skinny models?
The models in question were women, and it’s safe to say that they remain as waiflike as ever. But something occurred while no one was looking. Somebody shrunk the men.
"At that point you might as well save money and just go over to the boy’s department,” Mr. Nguyen said from his seat in the front row of the Benjamin Cho show, which was jammed as usual with a selection of reedy boys in Buffalo plaid jackets and stovepipe jeans, the same types that fill Brooklyn clubs like Sugarland.
George Brown, a booking agent at Red Model Management, said: “When I get that random phone call from a boy who says, ‘I’m 6-foot-1 and I’m calling from Kansas,’ I immediately ask, ‘What do you weigh?’ If they say 188 or 190, I know we can’t use him. Our guys are 155 pounds at that height.”
Their waists, like that of Mr. Svetlichnyy, measure 28 or 30 inches. They have, ideally, long necks, pencil thighs, narrow shoulders and chests no more than 35.5 inches in circumference, Mr. Brown said
In terms of image, the current preference is for beauty that is not fully evolved. “People are afraid to look over 21 or make any statement of what it means to be adult,” Ms. Cutrone said.
12 comments:
I won't deny that I've got a weakness for thinner guys, but usually in the 5'7" to 5'9" range but definitely not 150 pounds and over 6'. The two at the top are about as unsexy as you can get in my book. No one would mistake me for 21, but I think I may start using that "beauty that has not yet fully evolved" line in my personal ads from now on
As you can imagine, in my perpetual search for Fabulon images, I see more than my share of excessively skinny models. It is really disturbing. And just as stupid girls feel that they must emulate these anorexics, now stupid boys will, too. But you know, people more or less get what they deserve. Anyone with a real sense of self won't be affected one way or the other.
Personally, I like some meat on my men. And my women!
The concentration camp look.
Lovely.
I saw this in the times. Sick (all too often, literally, I'm afraid). Oddly enough, my husband (who is the spittin' image of his Alabama dirt farmer great granddaddy) fits this profile. He's 6' tall and 135/140 lb.s. Just a naturally skinny, wiry guy. Now, suddely, he's a male model prototype!
i am very glad to be a bear and in the bear culture. These skinny lads will never intimidate me into trying to look like a heroin addict.
"ms cutrone" should shut it
she is nowhere near 21 nor skinny
Well, on the bright side, if boys want to emulate this, they only have to starve themselves. If they wanted to emulate the old models, they had to use steroids, THEN starve themselves.
Since I'm tall and too skinny, I like that this is in style.
That said, I think The New York Times is a couple years late with this article and the look's probably on the way out.
I definitely filed this article under "things I've read that make me hate myself." :-)
This whole trend is ludicrous...as are the experts quoted in that article:
"This is consumer driven."
"This is client driven."
It's most interesting that masculinity per se is not valid in the fashion world now.
Like we all don't know it's a youth culture? Advertising drives that machine.
When folks stop buying the products the agencies will stop using the malnourished to represent the ideal form.
I blame PRADA. They started that skeletal zombie look.
This is just what I looked like until I was about 25 and now that it's cutting edge, I'm passed it. I hate cheap irony.
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