London - The average clothes size worn by British women is a size 16.
So when Emporio Armani started parading stick-thin models on Thursday, the fashion house should have known it was in for criticism.
Many campaigners thought they had seen the back of the industry using emaciated models to promote its creations.
In Milan, however, good intentions seemed to have gone out of the window.
Observers were shocked at the angular models wearing blue low-cut outfits for Emporio Armani show and took to Twitter to vent their dismay.
Songwriter Kyle Rankin posted: “I love your designs, always have and will. But please allow your models to EAT – it’s so hard to look at with their bones exposed.”
Another user, Pheobe Davis tweeted: “The Armani models are so painfully thin. How are they letting this happen?”
Models’ weight has been in the spotlight since 2006 when Uruguayan model Luisel Ramos dropped dead from heart failure minutes after stepping off the catwalk. The 22-year-old had spent three months on a near-starvation diet to lose even more weight.
In the wake of her death, models with a body mass index of 18 or under were banned from Madrid Fashion Week.
In 2012, Vogue, made a pact to protect the health of models by banning all fashion models younger than 16 or “who appear to have an eating disorder” from their pages. - Daily Mail