New approach to sizing ‘reduces complaints’
14/05/2013
It says body proportions change significantly with age: clothes for 60-year-old women should be designed differently to those for 18 year olds, even if they have the same body measurements. It suggests clothing design should take age-related changes into account.
Stephanie Müller from the Institute said: “In reality, whether someone perceives a garment to have a proper fit depends on how it looks and feels on their body.” These aspects are mainly influenced by the cut and the materials used.
Designing plus-size fashion is particularly challenging, requiring the changing proportions to be taken into account to fit across all dress sizes, she says. The team uses 250 “people rather than dummies” from all age groups and body types for the fitting tests.
The manufacturers' ready-wear measurement tables are updated and supplemented on the basis of the SizeGERMANY body measurement tables and the internal standards developed by Hohenstein.
Ms Müller added: “Our fitting tests enable the manufacturers to permanently adapt the fit of the entire garment range to the target group based on the resulting data. They can then independently continue the consistent optimisation during product development.
“In some cases we were able to reduce the number of complaints due to fitting problems by 50%.”
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