By Evelyn Ebrey.

Body size politics reached a fever pitch this year, as Ozempic mania, the return of Y2K’s body conscious trends, and fashion’s renewed fixation on thinness merged in a global storm, creating heated debate about who gets to take up space. The ripples of which eroded some of the progress made on size inclusivity in an insidious way, that was amplified by the regression in other areas of society. But when there’s so much on the line in terms of rights, it’s easy to think that body size doesn’t matter, however bodies, and specifically how women’s bodies are treated, has always been a battleground. One that fashion is often at the centre of.

If you felt like you have seen less plus size models in campaigns and on the runway this year, you would be right. At the Autumn/Winter 2025 fashion weeks in New York, London, Milan and Paris earlier this year, there were just 0.63% of the 12,790 looks on runways worn by plus-size models according to Felicity Hayward’s Including the Curve report. That was a massive drop of over 50% from the previous season.

Things weren’t much better in the recent international Spring/Summer 2026 shows with that figure rising fractionally to 0.8% for the representation of plus size models on the runway. It makes an interesting comparison to New Zealand Fashion Week 2025 which took place in late August and is about to showcase in Christchurch for the first time from 7 – 9 November.

While there was much to celebrate about the event’s return under new leadership, this was also the year of the benchmark: the first dataset specifically tracking body size across every show, all 1,142 runway looks (excluding childrenswear).

Across the week, straight-size models (sizes 6–10) wore 799 looks, making up 70% of the total. Mid-size models (sizes 12–14) appeared in 125 looks (10.9%), while plus-size models (16 and above) wore 64 looks (5.6%). Male models accounted for 12.9% of all appearances, while plus-size men wore just seven looks in total (0.69%).

In a global context, those figures are both sobering and promising. Aotearoa’s 5.6% for plus size female models may still be modest, but it’s meaningful for the direction of representation, especially for a country that was slow to feature curve models to begin with but has been catching up in recent years. 

“I walked in the Opening show, in the Kāhui Collective show (for Mitchell Vincent and Katherine Anne), in Karen Walker, in the Greathounds show, and in the Into the Archive show,” says plus size model Kaarina Parker. “I would love to be surprised by that figure. I really would. But I’m not.”

Pictured: Model Kaarina Parker.

Her words are not shaped by cynicism, but with the clarity of someone who is intimately familiar with how the fashion industry works and has observed the recent regression first-hand. Parker was also one of the models featured in the campaign that promoted the event and which was a step in the right direction, symbolising a new era for NZFW.

“It definitely felt like the spirit of inclusion was there, especially with the tone set by Dan Ahwa’s gorgeous campaign and opening show,” she adds.

That campaign, conceptualised by NZFW’s new Creative Director Dan Ahwa, was an invitation to see fashion differently. Shot in the lead-in to the event, it featured models across different ages, genders, and abilities including Molly Kate, who lives with Down Syndrome and wore one of the seven looks modelled by disabled models at the event.

“It had been several years since NZFW had a dedicated campaign shoot,” says Dan Ahwa. “We felt the desire to revive this in order to reassert the new team’s agenda and to ensure we had imagery that could capture the event and how we want to shape it moving forward. It’s an event all New Zealanders can be proud of and feel like they can contribute to positively – and the campaign imagery reflects not only our diverse ecosystem but also the people that make it special. Seeing Molly Kate wearing Juliette Hogan was special. Booking her for the runway was also a highlight of the week. Seeing a model such as Vinnie Woolston who has put New Zealand models on the map was really important in acknowledgement of his contribution to the event and our fashion industry; and that same week the campaign launched, Kaarina Parker had launched her book so it was such an honour to be able to celebrate her creativity too. We see models as people, not just clothes horses. They are people who have a full life outside of the fashion industry, and it was important to spotlight that in this campaign. Fashion isn’t just about clothing – it’s about your entire approach to how you live and how you honour your creativity. I wanted to capture that energy with this shoot and we can only build on that for the next campaign.” 

That emphasis on people, not bodies or tokens, is something Ursula Dixon, co-owner of Unique Model Management, says filtered through the whole week.

“The new NZFW team set the tone early when they committed to diversity even in the campaign a month out,” she says. “Choosing models like Kaarina, Carrie, and Adam Banoori as faces of the campaign really put down a marker for the vision they wanted to follow.”

Still, as Kaarina points out, inclusion on paper can feel different in practice.

“It was mixed across the shows,” she says. “You can always tell when you’re working with a stylist who is accustomed to only dressing a certain body type, and that’s not necessarily a criticism, but it is a grim reality of the industry. There are nuances to dressing different bodies (that is to say, not tall size 6/8 models) that you would only know from experience.”

It’s a simple observation but an important one: inclusivity is more than who walks the runway. It’s also how prepared the backstage teams are to support them. Whether garments are made to fit properly in their size, whether fittings run smoothly, whether competence instils models with confidence.

Ahwa acknowledges that this learning curve is part of the industry’s evolution.

“Casting has evolved,” he reflects. “This year we made the decision along with agencies to forgo the old group casting sessions. To me times have evolved and it was important that agents would have a more direct line to designers and vice versa. New Zealand Fashion Week’s role was to purely ensure we did due diligence by supporting the agencies, providing them with support and ensuring that every agency had an opportunity to participate in some shape or form. In recent times, I have witnessed how these casting sessions have become fodder for content creators and that sat uncomfortably with me personally. Models deserve respect and care, and we should provide them with safe spaces and opportunities to participate without having to feel like they have entered into a spectacle. They are turning up to a place of work, to work. That has been the biggest change over time.”

That seemingly small procedural change for this year’s event symbolises a deeper cultural shift.

“There has been some more concerted effort to ensure better diversity,” Ahwa says. “What it has been in the past couple of years has fared much better than those early days when models with disabilities, models over 50 were virtually non-existent. The progress has been slow.”

Ahwa’s Into the Archives opening show became a defining moment for the event – not just theatrically, but ethically.

“It was definitely a career highlight conceptualising and executing Into the Archives with my incredible team,” he says. “We fell in love with the process – and that truly is the approach. To be able to curate something that sets the tone for the new era was important, so too was the whakatauki kindly gifted to us from Kiri Nathan – ka mua, ka muri – walking backwards into the future. Casting 63 models was no mean feat but it was also important for me to ensure the show was not a tired nostalgia trip. Putting some of the most iconic pieces of New Zealand fashion from the past 30 years on fresh faces was important – it was about reframing the future of fashion and contextualising what New Zealand fashion even means for a new generation. That helped shape the way we told the story of the show, how we paced the running order, the soundtrack, and of course the way we curated our cast. All of these models and people have played a part in how we understand our creativity, how we use fashion and style as a tool to communicate, and how we celebrate our identity. Upon reflection, I’m proud of what we achieved and it was a necessary show to invest in so that we can take the event to where it truly needed to be. You have to raise the bar so high that you have no choice but to keep getting better.”

“It was a masterclass in casting,” adds Ursula Dixon. “There was no sense of box-ticking. Everything felt natural and intuitive. Each garment looked fitted to the individual wearing it.”

That thoughtful approach to casting was refreshing for the agency and while several Unique models featured in the opening show, their curve board including Kaarina, Genesia, Erin Labuschagne, Bridget, Rachel Robinson, Diamond Langi and Gigi, also walked across multiple NZFW shows.

“These were not token additions, they were part of the main fashion narrative,” Dixon says. “That’s something to be proud of.”

While previous years’ data was not recorded, the 64 plus size womenswear looks shown this year did seem like a visible step forward again from past NZFW events. When Ahwa first saw the new benchmark data, his response was measured.

“It’s commendable that this data has been collated and it is a useful tool to reference moving forward,” he says. “It displays some interesting insights, including the large number of ‘mid-sized’ models (a term that I still find polarising). This does feel like at least a shift away from some of the worrying casting we’ve seen internationally with almost all models a size UK 6.”

He also sees the data as an invitation to designers to look beyond surface metrics.

“It would be good for designers to consider how they design for bodies beyond a size 16,” he says. “Not every curve model on the runway was wearing an outfit that looked necessarily good. Just because it fits, doesn’t mean it’s fashion. That’s what I want to see more from designers and having this information will help them at least be a bit more mindful of how they interact with the concept of diverse casting in every facet of their business and creative decision making.”

Ursula Dixon believes that this kind of data will make agency work more strategic.

“At the end of the day, we’re a service industry to the fashion industry,” she says. “We provide what designers and casting directors want, but we also try to anticipate trends, to encourage them to book models in line with our vision.”

Her team’s decision to train and promote curve models on the same main board as straight-size models was deliberate.

“Having well-trained curve models with strong runway presence makes all the difference,” she says. “For us at Unique, it was a deliberate choice to treat curve fashion models the same as straight-size fashion models.”

While she praises NZFW 2025’s inclusivity, she also flags an issue that may shape the next decade of local modelling.

“One area I think needs more focus is the international pathways for curve models,” she says. “For straight-size models, we’ve long had success exporting talent. But for curve models, opportunities are fewer, and that flow-on effect could impact how sustainable a career in modelling feels for curve models here in New Zealand.”

That, she suggests, is the next step, ensuring that diversity at home doesn’t end at the runway’s edge.

“When we’re talking about representation and diversity in fashion, body size is only one part of that,” Kaarina Parker says. “I would love to see more fat models, just as I would love to see more POC models, queer and trans models, disabled models. We can’t fall into the trap of lifting up only one group to the detriment of others – that’s not real change or progress. It’s just tokenism.”

That wider lens on diversity mirrors Ahwa’s vision for the event.

“It’s New Zealand Fashion Week – so it’s extremely important that the faces on the runway are reflective of our unique and diverse population but ultimately, that is the overarching memo from NZFW – as for the designers themselves who are organising and casting their own shows – that is up to them to make that decision with who they cast,” he adds. “So long as the objective is clear as an organisation about how important it is for us to include diverse models, it’s ultimately up to the designers to make that call. For many of New Zealand Fashion Week’s owned shows, we work as a team collaboratively with producers and agencies to ensure we have a decent mix of models on the runway. To me personally, it’s also more important to ensure we have the best models possible no matter what gender, size or ethnicity. Confidence is the most important part of being a model and that is what I look for.

For Kaarina Parker, inclusion is not about statistics; it’s about visibility and belonging. Something this year’s indigenous designers and creatives proved yet again to be leaders of. Many of the plus size models featured in the likes of the Pacific Fusion and Kāhui Collective group shows among others, which featured diverse casting across the board.

“The Kāhui Collective show was really special,” she says. “A beautiful example of the unique talent and artistry that we have here in Aotearoa. I was proud to be a part of that. Also, the atmosphere at the opening show was absolutely electric — it was a very special and thrilling night to be a part of. I would love to see a future where anyone can watch a fashion show and find something or someone to relate to on the runway.”

In that sense, this year’s benchmark report is both record and roadmap – a mirror showing where we are, and a compass pointing to where we might go. And that’s the goal. Not a headline, not a hashtag, but a fashion industry in Aotearoa where everyone is included, always.

Evelyn Ebrey is a journalist and producer of Cutting the Curve, a new docu-series on RNZ that explores size inclusivity in the fashion industry through the eyes of plus size models.