Tara Lynn, cover girl for the ELLE plus size issue

Tara Lynn is one of the well known plus size models that V Magazine used in their shoot back in January when they were celebrating ‘real’ women.

The “Curves Ahead” shoot that she was featured in received a lot of attention on the net.

This is because photographers had tried to prove that big is beautiful, but had also retouched the photos to make them more ‘eye-friendly’.

When you are trying to get the message across that size doesn’t matter and beautiful doesn’t relate to a specific size, retouching the photographs seems somewhat contradictory.

This resulted in a bit of a storm in the online plus size community, with many regarding the pictures as a fake attempt by the industry to make people believe they were changing the image of fashion.

Although this feature has followed on from the likes of Dove’s ‘real women’ campaign, and Debenham’s bid to use larger size models and display figurines in their shops, there is still a long long way to go before we see the plus size community sufficiently represented in the fashion industry.

Following the current trend, French Elle decided to dedicate an entire issue to plus-size women, put model Tara Lynn on the cover… and undressed her inside the magazine.

Tara is beautiful (we’ve seen her in V’s Magazine Size Issue as well) and she does look plus-size (unlike other so called “plus-size” models).

Some of the online bloggers make an interesting point though – why is it that when attempting to prove that big is beautiful they need to shoot the models naked?

In a fashion magazine surely the aim is to show how the clothes will look good on larger women too – rather than trying so hard to show that larger bodies naked are beautiful too?

Some commentators are more in favour of Crystal Renn, a plus-size model who has recently been giving grief for being too small to be a plus size model.

They believe that Tara Lynn is too large, bordering on unhealthy – and that this sends the wrong message to readers who see her in a magazine and think her size is acceptable.

What I would say is that as long as you eat healthily, and exercise regularly, size is probably the least important thing to worry about.

If you follow a healthy regime, you will look and feel confident and beautiful – regardless of how many curves you have.