At Curvy Con, Things Get Personal—and Inspiring

It’s a fairly common complaint in fashion that not many designers cater to women who are larger than a size 12. While a few new collaborations, like Lane Bryant’s with Isabel Toledo, Lela Rose, Sophie Theallet, and Christian Siriano, have started to change that perception, there are still fewer options out there than most women would like.

What is a stylish woman to do?

Saturday afternoon, you could have found any number of answers at The Curvy Con, a day-long event of shopping and seminars organized by fashion bloggers Cece Olisa and Chastity Garner, and coinciding with Full Figured Fashion Week in New York. Some of the most popular bloggers in the business, those women who shoppers turn to for inspiration and advice, turned out in outfits that were pretty much as fabulous as you would expect.

Ty Alexander, whose blog is Gorgeous in Grey, wore a wild digital print wrap, strappy sandals and a white-polish pedicure. Nadia Aboulhosn (pictured, below), who has nearly 250,000 followers on Instagram and is known for her daring body-con style, wore a tailored black blazer detailed with gold filigree. The singer Kierra Sheard, in a black motorcycle jacket over a black maxi dress, was practically greeted as royalty as she introduced her new clothing collection, “eleven60,” where “high fashion meets the curvy woman.” While their advice was practical and applicable to anyone – find a good tailor, build a wardrobe of quality pieces over time – their stories were inspiring and personal. It’s not easy to put yourself out there for the world to judge, but many of these women who have are now building serious personal brands as a result.

“How many of you would love to bottle confidence?” asked Marcy Guevara, aka @themarcyminute, to a panel of experts that included our colleague Rosaliz Jimenez, the photo director of People StyleWatch (pictured top right, with, from left, Guevara, Sarah Conley of styleitonline and Chante Burkett of Everything Curvy and Chic). Well, no one can bottle confidence, but Jimenez had an eloquent argument for putting yourself out there anyway.

“Every Friday I make it a point to try a different trend – I’ll wear a hot pink skirt, I’ll wear something sheer, but of course tasteful because I work at a fashion magazine after all,” she said. “But I really make a point to try. If you don’t try, you’re never going to have the fun you deserve to have. You can’t wait until you lose 40 pounds to start living.”

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