Big Bitch Summer

Written by Lucy Latorre

Art by Lucy Latorre and Lauren Mallett

There is nothing more difficult than being a big bitch in a bathing suit. Well, maybe one thing: buying a bathing suit. From sweating in a Kohl’s dressing room to crying in a Macy’s bathroom, summertime shopping is my yearly nightmare. And yes, I mean yearly. In high school, I grew out of bathing suit tops every trip around the sun.

My rapid teenage growth not only meant new bathing suits, but trying to find ones that made me feel my age. For a time in life when weight fluctuation is at an all time peak, you’d think teen fashion brands would factor in a wider range of sizes. Instead, they shunned anyone above a size 10 to the adult sections, which meant flowery one- pieces fit for a grandmother. In senior year, with a class beach trip on the horizon, I knew it was time for a change.

I had never been a big fan of SHEIN. TikTok scrolling in 2020 proved to me that it was a terrible threat to our planet. But the girls around me seemed to love it. They would rock their tiny cheap bathing suits all summer. Plus, it wasn’t like I could walk into Hollister and find something since their sizes ran far smaller than anything I could fit in. With nowhere else to turn, I had to put aside my guilt and shop in SHEIN’s plus-size section.

It was like diving into a huge pool of sexy. People who looked like me were wearing things I never thought I could. Triangle bikini tops, barely-there thongs, and one-pieces that were practically no pieces— all reaching up to a size 20. It was a wonderland of sex appeal that I was finally able to achieve. But it came with that underlying guilt of slowly killing Mother Nature.

For the first time in my life, buying a bathing suit was easy. It was also far cheaper than any of my other options. My yearly bathing suit restock could get up to $90, if I was lucky
enough to find anything in stores. That’s not to say smaller bathing suits are always
cheaper: some PacSun suits are priced in the triple digits. Still, there’s always a clearance rack, a flash sale, or big bin of $10 bikinis to sort through if you’re a skinny girl looking for a cheap option. You’ll still have to look, but cheap bathing suits are a possibility, and you’ll probably find several in your size.
This is where the problem gets me really fired up. I am all for sustainable fashion; I work at a thrift store. I want my grandchildren to inherit a gorgeous planet with birds, lakes, and voluminous clouds just as much as the next person. But sustainability, especially in fashion, is not built for everyone—quite literally. There is a far smaller chance something second-hand will fit someone plus-sized, making it not always a realistic option. The same goes for other methods of sustainability. Sustainable houseware is often more expensive than their plastic counterparts and public transit can’t always get people where they need to go. It’s simply impossible for every individual to be sustainable, since it’s only really available to a sliver of the population.

Sustainability isn’t just a movement, but a conversation. One that is growing and changing with each new invention and innovation. It takes a certain amount of privilege to be sustainable, and even more to shame others for it. We have a very long way to go, and until obstacles are fixed, people will seek the easy way out. But that’s only because they need to. Skinny people don’t need to use SHEIN for cheap bathing suit options because sustainability is a system set up by them and for them.

I’m certain some of you skinnies read my title and came up with thousands of reasons why I am wrong, and I hope you have a refreshing size-two summer. As for the rest of us, if sustainability is not a guaranteed possibility, you’re damn right we’re logging on to SHEIN until what is achievable for some becomes achievable for all. Happy big bitch summer.