Visitors to London’s Victoria and Albert Museum on Friday afternoon to watch Sinéad O’Dwyer’s Fashion in Motion show would have encountered something a little different. The cast of performers and models wore everything from underwear to skirt suits and sequins, and sometimes danced interpretively on the catwalk to a performance by the band Jeanie and The White Boys, but most notably came in all shapes and sizes.
O’Dwyer’s work has pushed against fashion’s insistence on a thin body type since she appeared at London fashion week in 2021. If most brands make the samples for clothes shown on the catwalk based on a size 4-8, she uses a size 18. She has won awards for her work, as well as celebrity fans including Cardi B and Björk.