Who is the most desirable? The skinny vs curvy battle

For decades now there has been an ongoing battle between skinny vs curvy women. The fashion industry and the media define what is considered desirable by proposing an ideal of woman, the one that is on the cover of magazines as testimonial of what is cool and trendy.

But the skinny vs curvy question will always be present in our culture because is the spectrum of the imbalances of our society. We are growing bigger and bigger in size every year nonetheless we showcase thin women on the media.
So who is going to win? Who is going to be the most desirable creature on earth? A very skinny emaciated girl or a rosey abundantly curvy woman?

When I was a teenager

The 1980-90 was the era of the supermodels. My room was plastered with posters of the long legged Claudia Schiffer, Cindy Crawford and Elle McPherson – to name a few – I used to admire. I wanted badly to have the figure of those gorgeous women but I had to deal with a very Italian mother who was trying to stuff me as a turkey more than feed me, so I grew up loving my food too much to make it happen.

In those times supermodels were curvy, lean and pretty healthy. I remember when Helmut Newton was photographing a muscular Cindy Crawford striding down a staircase in Monte Carlo showing her toned – absolutely not skinny – legs. She was – and still is – absolutely gorgeous.

I love that woman the fashion industry was showing to the world when I was barely a teenager. There was no need for a battle skinny vs curvy because there was fairly good balance of lean and fat in their bodies. Most of the super top models were on the thin side but their body mass index was not impossibly low like today. They were still promoting a fairly reasonable body image and were not raising the many questions on the models’ wellbeing that we sadly have nowadays.

Does Beautiful mean Healthy?

Not necessarily. Despite this ongoing battle skinny vs curvy to identify who looks best, we all recognise what is healthy. A glowing complexion, a flawless skin, a toned muscle and a curvy and lean figure – the most desirable “hourglass shape” – are all components of a healthy body that is neither too skinny nor too curvy.
When I talk about a lean body, this is what in my mind is a healthy body, at least from an external point of view. And I believe that generally speaking a healthy body is an attractive one as well where there is not need to compare skinny vs curvy.

I believe that every single woman – no matter the size or shape – is absolutely beautiful but I personally do not feel that either an extra large or extra small size is “healthy” and therefore is something I do not aspire to.

I know that some people will cry in outrage at this, but if we are really honest we all know that any extremes in weight are dangerous for the wellbeing of a person and there is a good reason for this called nature. By nature we are attracted by what is healthy more than any other extreme of the spectrum. It is a means of survival for our specie and therefore it is there for a good reason.

Today’s battle skinny vs curvy

In the last decade catwalk models have been growing dangerously skinny. Surely some of them are naturally that way but many others look worryingly unhealthy and underfed.
Fashion designers that wanted to maintain that impossible standard to showcase their garments by using live “mannequins” walking down the runway are now realising that it is time to change because women do not recognise themselves in that model of the world anymore.

Women have finally started to accept and love their curvy bodies and as a consequence fashion designers are pushed to using more and more what they call “plus size models“. But again this label is a way of identifying something that deviates from the norm which makes me think again that there is a battle going on between skinny vs curvy in people’s mind.

To us a woman does not have to be labelled curvy, skinny, thin or plus size to be beautiful and attractive. There will always be overweight women who gain weight only by looking at a piece of cake and women who will never eat a pin more than they need to survive. But whilst all of them – and everything there is in between – are beautiful, not all of them are to be considered healthy or something to aspire to.

In the battle between skinny vs curvy, we choose healthy all the way!