Italian Vogue Adds to Its Curvy Message

By CATHY HORYN

Italian Vogue’s June cover.

“Real Beauties” is the title of the June issue of Italian Vogue, which highlights women with more shape than the typical model. Steven Meisel shot the feature in a private home in Los Angeles.
Italian Vogue is hardly the first magazine to show curvaceous women — American Vogue has long had a shape issue — but last year its editor, Franca Sozzani, started an online column called Curvy that has become popular. And she has been critical of Web sites that promote excessive thinness among young women. I haven’t seen the June issue yet, but the cover evokes a nostalgic lushness. Or, thinking about the new television series “The Playboy Club” or those Berlusconi women, maybe it’s not nostalgic at all. What should happen is that magazines routinely include a range of body types.