Sastro Circle supports inclusiveness and diversity within the fashion industry by celebrating style for men who are 5'8 and shorter.
Sastro Circle is the community and branded content surrounding the current academic research of Henry Navarro and Osmud Rahman at Ryerson University, Toronto, Ontario. This page is dedicated to the research published to date.
If you are a man of modest height or want to change the lack of inclusion in the current fashion system, we would love to hear from you. We are always seeking more participants for our study. So please get in touch sastrocircle@gmail.com .
Abstract: This article focuses on short male consumers and fashion design. There are two reasons why we chose short men for this study. First, male consumers who are shorter than 5’8” have been ignored by most of the mainstream fashion brands (Brock, 2013). Second, “scholarly research has almost exclusively focused on women, leaving a critical gap in the research on men’s fit issues and preferences (Chattaraman et al. (2013, p. 291).”
To cite this article: Osmud Rahman & Henry Navarro (2017) Fashion Design for Short Male Consumers, The Design Journal, 20:sup1, S2679-S2688, DOI: 10.1080/14606925.2017.1352779
Keywords: male consumers, clothing fit, body type, anthropometric data
... it is important for the fashion practitioners to understand the relationships between the body type and garment fit in order to produce desirable and good fitting garments as well as to establish a relevant and updated Size Chart for today’s consumers...
Keywords: short men, body image, height, heightism, clothing choice
According to several studies, height may be used consciously or unconsciously to judge the ability, competence, and intelligence of an individual male. Indeed, “heightism” or prejudice and discrimination against shorter men, does exist in our society (Melamed and Bozionelos, 1992).
Keywords: short men, garment fit, body size, clothing
Among our reviewed literature, only two studies (Shim & Kotsiopulos, 1991; Shim et al., 1990) specifically focused on big and tall male apparel shoppers. However, short male consumers have never been investigated. In light of the limitations in the prior research, the present study attempts to fill this void by studying the body size, shopping behaviour, and fit preferences of male consumers who are shorter than 5’ 8”.
© 2017, International Textile and Apparel Association, Inc.
ITAA Proceedings, #74 – www.itaaonline.org
Keywords: Menswear, short, height, inclusion
Men whose height falls below 5’ 8” are out of luck if they want to consume fashion products (Frith and Gleeson, 2004). Sleeves, pant legs, and shirts are always unflatteringly long. Ties, belts, and shoes look disproportionally odd, while fabric prints, buttons, and pockets are ever too large. Such is the shopping experience of approximately 33 percent of the consumer market in North America (Mak, 2016). The lack of size inclusion in menswear for consumers below the 5’ 8” average height, has social and emotional impacts for a significant number of the population (Mishkind et al., 1986 and Mak, 2016) as well as ethical (Melamed and Bozionelos, 1992) and economic implications for the fashion industry. The practice-led research outlined here proposes an experimental apparel sizing range for men of modest
height (5’ 8” or under) by taking into account the diversity of body types found within that height group.
© 2017, International Textile and Apparel Association, Inc.
ITAA Proceedings, #74 – www.itaaonline.org