Hayley Hasselhoff talk plus sized modelling, body image and beauty

SHE has a famous surname, but Hayley Hasselhoff is stepping out of Dad’s shadow. The model has a lot to say about the industry’s idea of beauty ... And it’s not what you think.

The gorgeous Hayley Hasselhoff. Picture: Chris Pavlich for mX

IT SEEMS like almost every week we have a fresh debate about body size in the media — thigh gaps one day, booster bras the next.

So you’d be forgiven for thinking that someone in the thick of the industry might be growing fatigued about all the talk surrounding a woman’s body and what it should look like.

Not so if you’re Hayley Hasselhoff.

The bubbly 21-year-old model and actress is making a career out of talking about body image — and believe me, she can talk.

News_Image_File: Hayley on set. Yes, she is the daughter of David.

“I just like talking, and I’m really truthful,” she tells news.com.au. “Sometimes things come out of my mouth and I think, maybe I shouldn’t have said that, but at the end of the day I am who I am! When I’m not acting I’m going to be fully Hayley Hasselhoff, and that’s what you’re going to get. And I enjoy that.”

Apart from fashion — Hasselhoff brought six suitcases with her for a two-week trip around Australia — the thing she enjoys most of all is talking about body image. A plus-sized model since the age of fourteen, Hasselhoff lives and breathes the industry, and can barely contain her excitement about where it’s heading.

“We’re getting to this amazing place where the average size in America is a 14-16 and we’re starting to see that represented in the fashion industry and it’s becoming more accepted,” she says.

News_Image_File: Hayley’s been modelling since she was 14-years-old.

“I don’t resent being known as plus sized at all. When it comes to words or terms like that, it’s just the way you look at it and the way you perceive it. For me, I’ve been a plus-size model since I was 14. I don’t have any bad thoughts about it, only have good ones, because I’ve had a beautiful journey along with it. It’s taught me so much.”

The problem, according to Hasselhoff, is the way people outside of the fashion industry view being plus sized.

“There’s two different types of plus size — there’s plus size in the world, which may seem demeaning, but then there’s plus size in the industry, which is completely different,” she explains.

“People always want to go to the extreme negative side of things, and it’s the same with plus-sized models. Plus size in the industry means curves. Let me break it down for you. Straight sized boards are models size 0-6. Plus size boards are models starting at a 10. If a size 8 girl was 5’ 11 and curvy, she’d be on the plus sized board, because there’s nothing in between.

News_Image_File: Hayley Hasselhoff arrives at Sydney Airport. News_Image_File: Inspiration: Aussie model Robyn Lawley.

“Look at Robyn Lawley — she’s a plus size model but she’s with Ralph Lauren now. She’s deemed plus size because that’s what board she fits on to in the industry. My first shoot was on a rooftop in swimsuits with two plus-size models who were curvy and voluptuous and beautiful, and they taught me so much about being beautiful in any shape or size.

“But when people on the outside pick and choose when they want to use the term plus size, that’s what makes it confusing. They use it as a label. Plus-sized models are everywhere, not just on the runways deemed plus size, or on the body image advocacy boards.

“I was just in London, and I was looking through a magazine and there was a lingerie editorial in it, and the girl in it was curvy — she had a beautiful body. But nowhere on that page did it say plus size — she was an unnamed model. I remember looking at it and going, ‘That girl’s for sure on the plus size board’. I went and had a meeting and I showed the agency the example, and they were like, ‘Yep, she’s on our plus size board, we just booked her’.”

And this, says Hasselhoff, is where things get exciting.

News_Image_File: Hayley Hasselhoff is plus size model in Australia to promote health body image. Picture: Chris Pavlich for mX

“Plus-size models are being used around the world in editorials, but nobody knows, until we use the term ‘plus size’ when it has to do with body image or body advocacy.

“Around the British Plus Size Fashion Weekend, they hyped up the word ‘plus size’, because there were all different body shapes on that runway. And that’s great for awareness, but in magazines, plus-size models are being used and it’s not being named as such.

“Yeah, we could be calling out every plus-sized model in a magazine, but how cool is it that right now, industry-named plus-sized models are appearing naturally in editorials, and there’s a body image movement going along with it? And it’s so much better because the models are the ones that are advocating body image organically. It is so much juicier and more empowering.

News_Module: Doing the rounds on Aussie TV

“There’s stepping stones going along around the world, and it’s in fashion that things are starting to intertwine.

“The world is taking those steps to body acceptance, no matter the size, and it’s actually starting in the fashion industry. I think it’s so beautiful, because it’s letting people of all shapes and sizes feel comfortable in who they are and what they look like. And I’m just so happy that I can be a part of that.

“I hope that what’s happening is that young women are realising that who they are is so special — not who they should be or who they want to be or who someone tells them they can be — but who they are right now. We need to appreciate who we are, today.”

News_Module: One of Hayley's many looks