I am tall and plus sized and it is a nightmare to know what size I am supposed to be of anything. I am anywhere from a size UK 12 to UK 18 depending on the brand / item etc.
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Women’s clothing is based on an arbitrary system that isn’t standardized. It starts at 00 (or 000) and increases in increments of two (in the US. UK and Australia use a similar system but have a different starting point), which obviously has no correlation to any human measurement.
Different brands cater to different demographics or body types. If Brand A caters to prim upper class 20somethings and uses all flat-bottomed, bony models, their sizes are probably going to run smaller than Brand B that caters to working class baddies who admire an hourglass shape or Brand C that caters to women in their 50s who naturally run quite a bit bigger.
Ladies sizes also run on the same theoretical scale as women’s/plus size and junior’s sizes (with junior’s using 0 and odd numbers until junior’s plus when they use even numbers, and ladies’ using 0 and even numbers), but do not actually follow the same sizing standards. So even within the same brand, ladies size 14, a juniors plus 14, and a plus 14 will all likely be different sizes. And you’d think a Junior’s 7 would be between a ladies’ 6 and 8, but it’s closer to a ladies’ 4. To make it more confusing, some junior’s brands will use even numbering anyway. So adult women will be like “why is this size 6 the size of an ant,” when it’s honestly for a teenager.
The final reason is that men care so much less how their clothes fit and will schlump around in anything. Their clothes, despite using an “objective” scale, actually vary nearly as much as women’s, but if a man decides he’s a medium, and the store he shops at vanity sizes, he’ll just slob around in too-big clothes. A women shopping at a vanity sized store who thinks she’s an 8 will see the 8 is too big and buy a 6.
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