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Beth Ditto knows a thing or two about fashion. Apart from her singular personal style (both onstage and off), the Gossip frontwoman has hit the runways for both Jean Paul Gaultier and Marc Jacobs. Now she’s taking matters into her own hands, launching an eponymous plus-size clothing line that will debut in February, featuring eclectic styles in American sizes 14 to 30. Today, a first taste of the range came as she introduced a T-shirt in collaboration with Gaultier (also the man behind her stunner of a wedding gown), printed with his iconic bullet-bra bustier à la Blonde Ambition—and featuring functional corset laces. Though Ditto couldn’t say too much about the rest of her forthcoming collection, we caught up with her via phone to talk about the changing face of plus-size fashion, thrifting, and “hauling ass” for Marc Jacobs.
How did the collaboration on the Gaultier shirt come about? We were brainstorming who we could get to do this, who would be a good fit, and of course I was: “Gaultier! Of course!” And he immediately was like, “Yeah, of course” and had the design done! It’s almost too good to be true, because we’re both wacky people and it’s really refreshing. One of the first times I met him, he was talking about the piranha movie in 3-D [Piranha 3D], and he was like, “You have to see it!” I was like, “You get me.” To me, that speaks volumes—ring-a-ding-ding, perfect! He’s that kind of person. There was no hem-hawing [about the collaboration] or “What’s it going to be?” He immediately had an idea and put it into motion, and I just loved that. The back of [the shirt] is crazy. It’s beyond what anyone imagined. When you say “design a T-shirt,” you think, Oh, a picture and a signature.
You’ve walked on runways a couple of times—what has that experience been like for you? Great! You know . . . I can walk. [laughs] I love to dress up, and I also love when you lend yourself to someone’s vision. You get to wear these crazy things, and you get to have incredible people do your makeup, and you get to meet people who are the crème de la crème, the top of their game, and you realize why they are. I love hanging out with the models, don’t get me started! [At Marc] there was a group of three of us and we cleared out a little area backstage, and I was like, “Y’all gotta teach me how to walk!” I’m not even 5 feet 2! When we were doing rehearsals, they were like, “Okay, Beth, you gotta keep up!” I was trucking it. I was trying not to laugh, because I could see myself hauling ass. Everybody else was so beautiful and graceful and working it, and I was like, Keep up, fucking keep up. [laughing] And in high heels—I never wear them, because they hurt, honestly, and I don’t like to be in pain. By the end of it, when I would turn a corner, I would see people I knew and they’d be like “Yay, Beth!” and I could tell that they knew that I was busting ass. It was like a marathon. The pictures I saw, my mouth looks like I’m trying not to laugh because I can feel my short legs giving out. I was trying to have stoic Model Face, which I don’t have. I have Southern Face, which is its own genre.
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Gaultier has always cast women of different ages and sizes in his runway shows, but do you see fashion on the whole moving in the right direction when it comes to inclusiveness of plus sizes? I don’t know what other people have to say, but I see all these really cool startup companies, these young designers doing things—you see [progress being made]. There’s no doubt in my mind. The Gossip was a band for 16 years. I was 18 years old when it started, so we’re talking about the year 2000, 1999, and the difference . . . . I remember one photo shoot we did, and I won’t say who it was [with], but they just flat-out fucking refused to make me anything. And it [was brands] that you know, and they have completely changed their tunes. I wouldn’t say I was the first, by any means, but I definitely felt the effects of being part of the push for it. Now you see all these young girls and boys designing things on their own,
super-DIY. The Internet changed things, Facebook changed things—Instagram is incredible, because it doesn’t become about the fashion industry anymore, it becomes about made for us, by us. And I think the industry can’t ignore that. I say it tongue-in-cheek—we live in a capitalist society, and everyone’s talking about how America’s just getting fatter. When are [brands] gonna get with the program? Don’t you want to capitalize on this? Come on! The health industry already has!
It’s come from a place where I used to go to do photo shoots for really great magazines, and the only thing that people could pull, if they didn’t find designers who would specifically make it for me, was fucking coats. I swear to God, if I see another coat with a belt around it, I’m going to throw up. I just don’t understand! No one’s putting on her parka and is like, “You know what this needs? A belt with a big buckle.” I always feel lucky that I do have this body, because it made me extremely, extremely resourceful, and extremely creative.
When you were coming up, you were DIY-ing and thrifting a lot of pieces, right? Of course, still do. I’m on my way to Goodwill!
How did that inform you in designing your own line?
[It informed] everything. That’s the thing that’s so important to me, that it’s made for someone who knows the struggle: what fabric feels good on your body, what the challenges are, what a good silhouette is—people don’t always take that into consideration. So I get to take all of that cool shit that I learned from thrifting and all of those images—things that you can’t find. And another thing is that when you are thrifting and doing vintage, the best shoes are always a size 5; you find these beautiful dresses from the ’60s, and they’re going to be a size 8. So I get to make them for [plus sizes], and that’s great, too.
Is the new collection vintage inspired? It’s not really vintage inspired; it’s more shape inspired, creating really good shapes that don’t exist yet. I’m excited to see how this [collection] goes, because in the next one we can keep tweaking it. The idea is to make mainstay shapes that are staples that you can wear forever and rely on. Because that exists for thin people, but it does not exist for big people yet.