L OUD B ODIES WORD S S CA R L ET T HATCHWE LL W i th a l l the clot hin g ma de and sold by Loud Bod ies, a very re a l s e n s e of pride come s a ttached to the p rice tag – p rid e in yo u r s i ze , in you r fa s hion sense, and , most imp ortantly, in yo u rs e l f . I n t e n t ion a lly imple mented by the brand’s founder, P a t ri c i a L uiza Bla j, it’s ju s t one of the ways the brand chang es u p o u r e xpe ct a t ion s of a usually lacklustre size- inclusive cl o th i n g i ndu s t ry. Fro m u s i ng on ly re cycle d materials in its p ackag ing , to d i s c u ss i n g pe rs on a l polit ics and ethical b ody p ositivity on its b l o g, this Roma n ia n bra n d is taking the p lus- size fashion wo rl d b y s t orm. Offe rin g clothes in sizes XXS to 7XL, with cu st o m si ze s a n d Ta ll a n d Pe tite op tions availab le, it’s clear Bl a j t a ke s t he t e rm ‘in clu s ive’ seriously, and is p aving the wa y fo r a ll fa s hion bra n ds t o do the sam e. When did you first realise you had to create fashionable clothes for all bodies? Patricia Luiza Blaj: I’ve been into fashion for as long as I can remember. My mother’s a very coquette woman, and her wardrobe was a literal wonder when I was little. I’ve always looked up to her and her style, which only made it more heartbreaking when, growing up, I realised they don’t make the same clothes for anybody over a size M. I remember being in Zara, wanting a shirt in an L. When I asked the shopkeeper, she looked me up and down – you know the look – and said for certain models, they only carry sizes up to M. It was a shirt, not some sort of outlandish item they’d expect plus size women wouldn’t be bold enough to wear (not that an L is plus size in any universe).
In my career, I’d started out as a journalist but it was difficult to find work as, in a country as deeply fatphobic as Romania, brands really didn’t want to work with me. I’ve been writing and blogging since I was 14, and working in the industry was my dream – a dream I was forced to move on from when I realised I had no chance of making it here. If the problem is that I don’t look ‘appropriate’, and don’t shy away from subjects like body activism, LGBTQIA+ rights or feminism, then it never would’ve mattered how hard I worked. And compromising who I am and what I believe in to become easier on the eyes, and get paid in the process, has never been an option for me. So, I guess Loud Bodies is sort of my Phoenix, rising from the ashes of my dead dream.
How would you tell the story of your own journey with body image? PLB: I was a very skinny kid, but after a two week hospitalisation for a serious allergy, its treatment caused me to gain weight. So, I became a chubby kid and was suddenly aware of my body even before my teenage years. As a teenager, I struggled to lose weight. I couldn’t see working out or eating well just as a means of taking care of my body, but only as something I desperately needed to do to shrink, and this slowly but surely slid me towards bulimia. I only managed to accept it, and start kicking it, in my second year at University. In my started couldn’t my size
recovery, my body growing. The fact I find clothes I liked in only added insult to 71