This most recent fashion month marked the unencumbered return of full-throated, high-production presentations from brands, but it also signaled a potentially worrisome trend. A lack of size diversity was felt, with many commentators and writers wondering if hard-fought gains towards greater size inclusivity in shows and campaigns were being eroded overnight. Still, there were meaningful and exciting debuts of curve models in the fray. One of those ecstatic arrivals was 23-year-old Grace Breuning, who made her Paris Fashion Week debut through walking for Chanel, many a model’s dream booking.
The Minneapolis native was a knockout in an expertly tailored snow-white tweed short set. The casting was particularly meaningful for a brand that went ten years without casting a curve model between 2010 and 2020. Breuning was one of only three curve models for the spring 23 show. “Growing up I never saw somebody that was confident as a bigger girl,” Breuning says a few days after the whirlwind experience. Breuning says the few representations of curve women she saw in popular culture growing up felt leagues away from empowerment. “It was always, like, the comedic relief,” she says. “So to be cast as a curve model in the Chanel show? I was just grateful. It’s hard to put into words.”
Still, while Breuning’s name is surely on many people’s lips now, she has lived in New York and been modeling for a few years now—mostly commercial gigs. Her debut at Chanel, however, seems to signal a shift to luxury brands and runway shows.
Breuning is acutely aware of the incremental steps towards more stronger, varied, and consistent representation of different body types taking place in fashion. She is grateful to be part of that progress, even with its challenges. “I knew all the steps that had to be taken to get to that place,” she says. “So it was very bittersweet. It’s still the fact that when I go there, I’m not seen as the model sometimes. I’m asked if I’m on the hair team, I’m asked if I’m this. As incredible as it is, it’s still a long way to come.”
She says a key part of the experience at Chanel was not feeling as if she was merely filling a diversity slot or thrown into second-tier garments. (Which, sadly, is a feeling she has encountered during gigs.) “When I went in for my casting with Chanel, they had like three outfits that fit me,” she says. “So when I walked in, I was like, ‘okay, they’re not just throwing me in here to throw me in there as their, like, curve quota.’”
Source: Vouge
