According to Ashley Graham's Stylist, There's Only One Trick to DressingCurvier Body Types

Publish date: 2024-06-11

When it comes to New York Fashion Week, no brand knows how to throw an event quite like 11 Honoré. Last February, the e-commerce site — which sells designer collections exclusively in sizes 10 to 22 — had Laverne Cox walk its runwayin a gorgeous Zac Posen gown. This time, it decided to switch things up a bit, throwing a cocktail party in collaboration with Good American. As guest gathered at the Gramercy Hotel in NYC, models walked through the crowd in shoppable outfits that, of course, included some fabulous jeans.

“The goal was to have them styled looking and feeling their best, and then, people can immediately go and buy it on the site,” Jordan Foster, who styled the event, tells InStyle. “It's not a show, but it's showing the clothes in a different way.”

Sansho Scott/BFA.com

Aside from working on 11’s Honoré’s event, Foster is a fan of the site in real life, too.

“I style Ashley Graham, who is — we don't call it plus-size, she is just a model — but she happens to be a curvier girl,” she says. “I've pulled from 11 Honoré many times for Ashley, because sometimes, she is that size 16, which brands just are not making. I love 11 Honoré. I think what they're doing is so smart. Women need that access, and it's just discouraging and upsetting that it's so impossible to get these high-end designers in these sizes.”

When asked about tips for styling curvier shapes, Foster admits she doesn’t have any — for a good reason.

“With any woman, everybody's body shape is different, so I don't even think of it as ‘How does a curvy girl dress herself?’ I think of it as, ‘How does any woman dress herself?’ I have the body of an 11-year-old boy, so I dress myself a certain way. I'm very straight with no hips, and I have to do a lot of tricks even in my own styling, so it's really just about knowing your body. It’s a hard question to answer. I would have to answer it to a hundred different women to get that answer.”

Sansho Scott/BFA.com

While there were plenty of stunning looks to been seen throughout the night, which included items from big names such as Carolina Herrera and Sally Lapointe, Foster had a specific one in mind for Graham, who is currently pregnant with her first child.

“They have this one look by Juan Carlos Obando that I think is the most gorgeous look ever,” she admits. “It’s a blush silk trench ($1,295) with a matching skirt ($1,295), and I'm stealing it to try on Ashley tonight. I want to tie it above her bump and just have it be a really beautiful, chic look.”

Her advice for styling a growing baby bump?

“The main thing is to 100 percent be comfortable,” she says. “Your baby's happiest when you're comfortable. Ashley is at the stage now where she's showing quite a bit, so form-fitting is always good. I wore a ton of form-fitting stuff while I was pregnant, and I don't do that in my day-to-day life. It’s also always good to have those basics and then start getting into different things like accessories, shoes that are more fun, and cropped jackets that you can wear that will really show that you're pregnant. Because if you start to try to hide your bump, you're just going to look like one big sack, basically. I'm all about accentuating the bump.”

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