H&M has long been one of my favorite stores. They have cute clothes and the fact that I wear a size eight there makes me believe clothes aren’t horrible. As opposed to Victoria Secret where I’m usually throwing things off and skipping dessert later. That was until H&M has recently coped to the fact that their models are not actual people but computer generated. This severely creeps me out.  I understand models are photoshopped but this is going more than overboard. The “models” are composed by placing the head of a real model on a digital body. The body is then retouched to match the face. Most American lines use “vanity sizing”, or numbers that are lower than the true size, which is why the same size doesn’t always fit from a different line. While European sizing, like H&M, tends to be more true to form. As a consumer, it concerns me that a designer would opt to use a creation to represent the clothing line instead of an actual person. Fashion designers aren’t exactly notorious for understanding how to dress a woman outside of a size two. Now, with H&M, what the consumer sees as a comparison of how the items “should fit” is less than a size zero. In an industry where size six models are considered “plus size” I don’t think the image the consumer sees needs to be anymore retouched.

H&M defended its choice by stating that it saves time from photoshopping every model. If you’re spending that much time photoshopping your models that you need to make computer animated ones, maybe you’re photoshopping too much. Just a thought. Speaking as a consumer and as a woman, I prefer to see a woman less photoshopped. It’s impossible not to compare how you wear the clothes to how the images placed around the store wear them. Whether you, as a consumer, realize it or not.

It’s unclear if the sizing has changed based on the images or if it’s just the images they are using are their sites. Either way, as a consumer, I’m disappointed in their promotion and encouragement of digital models.