# Paloma Elsesser Wants Designers to Stop Playing It Safe with Curve Models

> Nearly a decade into her runway career and six years into judging the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund, Paloma Elsesser says designers have grown more comfortable with a range of body types, but she is tired of being handed the same stretch knit dress or jacket by default.

- Source: Monaco Day
- Canonical URL: https://monacoday.com/en/article/paloma-elsesser-fearless-designers-curve-models
- Author: Antoine Vasseur
- Section: Fashion & Style
- Published: 2026-10-20T13:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-20T13:00:00.000Z
- Tags: Paloma Elsesser, CFDA Vogue Fashion Fund, Body Diversity
- French edition: https://monacoday.com/article/paloma-elsesser-fearless-designers-curve-models

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Paloma Elsesser spent the day before her appearance on Vogue's The Run Through podcast hosting a backyard barbecue for 35 people at her home in Brooklyn, complete with homemade mocktails and her younger brother working the grill. Sitting down with hosts Chloe Malle and Nicole Phelps, she brought a similar warmth to a conversation about her sixth year judging the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund, a role she holds as the first model ever invited onto the panel.

Elsesser said she has used that position to steer the judging panel's conversations beyond a designer's scalability and toward questions of inclusivity across age, gender expression and body type, often pairing a practical question with an emotional one when she talks to finalists. The same instinct carried into her work fronting Vogue's shopping newspaper this season, which she styled herself alongside her longtime friend and stylist Allie, describing fashion's move away from a quiet luxury moment she felt had sanded down too many people's personal style.

Her own wardrobe grew out of necessity rather than trend. Unable to find trousers cut properly for her body early in her career, she built a signature look around Dickies and Chanel flats, pairing workwear toughness with a more polished, balletic edge, a combination she still dresses around today after years spent hunting through archive sales for pieces that actually fit.

Nearly ten years into her runway career, Elsesser said designers have genuinely grown more comfortable working with a wider range of body types, but she has grown tired of being handed the same stretch knit dress or jacket by default as a curve model. She stopped short of calling the pattern lazy, pointing instead to fear driving the industry's limited imagination, and closed with the same guiding principle she said she tries to live by during fashion month: think critically, not be critical.

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Originally published by Monaco Day. Free to cite with attribution and a link to https://monacoday.com/en/article/paloma-elsesser-fearless-designers-curve-models.