“It’s ok to be yourself, even if you happen to exist in a fat body,” Tess says, spreading a message of acceptance

Jan 27, 2015 10:52 GMT  ·  By

Tess Holliday, also known as Tess Ryan or Tess Munser, is a model and a blogger, a mother and working woman, star and founder of the viral campaign #effyourbeautystandards. She is also a size 22 and has recently signed with modeling agency MiLk, which makes her the first model of her weight to get a contract.

Tess has been working in the industry since a very young age, but she was told from the start that she was too short and too heavy to make it as a model, even a plus-size one. Her latest accomplishment is now meant to shut all those haters up, and enforce the thing she’s been saying all along: beauty comes in all shapes and sizes.

A dream come true

As the New York Daily News notes, plus-size models are no longer a rarity in fashion, at least not as they were a few years back. Today, we might even get to see plus-size girls in high fashion magazines or up on catwalks, as part of a small-size showcasing.

Still, the average plus-size model is between the US sizes 8 and 16, which makes Tess a rarity at 22. She is also shorter, but as you can see in the photos included in this article, she is of a striking beauty and seems to have the right attitude for the job as well.

“I think we're the only agency with a model of her size. She is by far the largest model I have in the (Curves) division,” Anna Shillinglaw, the owner and director of MiLk Model Management, says for the publication.

MiLk came across Tess on social media: her Facebook and Instagram pages are packed with modeling shots or photos from her everyday life, in which she shows off her unmistakable style, her eye-popping fashion and her unbreakable confidence.

She was the right woman for this distinction of being the heaviest model to land a modeling contract, Shillinglaw stresses.

Stick and stones may break my bones

As the nursery rhyme goes, “Stick and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me,” Tess has learned to be confident in her own skin, in her own life and to do her best to shine bright despite of what critics may have to say about her.

And they have plenty of that, as the comments on any and all her Instagram photos, for instance, reveal. For starters, she’s positioning herself as some kind of role mode and, this way, telling women of all ages that it’s ok to be as heavy as she is. At size 22, healthy is probably the last thing she is, they say.

Tess doesn’t pay any attention to that: her mantra is that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes, and she’s beautiful even if she’s “trapped” in this fat body.

Moreover, she tells the aforementioned publication, it’s not like she’s urging all women to let themselves go until they get her size. On the contrary, she is telling them to stay active and take care of their body, just like she does.

“I never sit down. If I'm not shooting twelve hours a day, I'm out doing errands and going to meetings,” she says. She also has a personal trainer with whom she works out at least 4 times a week, and enjoys swimming, hiking and long walks.  

✨@danabrushette & I make magic ✨loved working with her in #Toronto last year 🙌 #tessmunster #tessholliday #model #plussize #effyourbeautystandards A photo posted by ✨Tess Munster💯✨ (@tessholliday) on Jan 7, 2015 at 2:04pm PST