There is a particular kind of creative freedom that comes from losing the thing you've always relied on. When COVID made it impossible for me to continue printing fabric — the one thing my brand had been built around for years — I found myself having to answer some hard questions that had been milling around in the back of my mind for some time. Who am I as a designer without print? What can I offer that has nothing to do with the one thing that has shaped my whole career up until this point?
I wrote about that pivot in my last post. What I didn't write about was everything else that opened up in that same period of reinvention — including a decision I took a chance on, that I really wanted to work, and that has become one of the things I'm most proud of about where Maya Prass is today.
Extending the size curve, all the way to a 46.
Where it started
For most of my career, the sizing I offered reflected the sizing the fashion industry had trained me to think of as standard. A size 32 to 42, with the real focus sitting between 34 and 38. It wasn't a conscious decision to exclude anyone. It was simply the water I was swimming in.
But I would have customers come to studio open days and events, try things on, and say some version of the same thing: I love your work. I just wish there was something that fit me. I would hear it, feel it, and move on to the next thing without really stopping to ask why I wasn't doing something about it.
When everything else about the business was being reimagined anyway, that question finally had space to be answered. So we extended into size 44 and 46. A fuller range of eight sizes with every style available across all of them.
It started as an experiment. It has become something I can't imagine the brand without.
Why it matters to me personally
I am a size 40 — I've also been a 38 and a 42. I am not in the extended plus size category by most definitions, but I have spent my whole life feeling like I was on the wrong side of whatever line the fashion industry had drawn.
As a teenager, I would walk into shops and fall in love with things that I couldn't have. Size XL was scarce, and when I did find it, it would often get stuck over my bust or hips, or squash my arms and stomach. Or I'd find something in my size, put it on, and discover that a loose fit cannot masquerade as a bigger size — the armholes would still be too tight and the silhouette distorted.
For a long time I compensated by buying things that were available rather than things I actually wanted.
What's strange, looking back, is that this experience didn't immediately change how I designed. I was so deep in the logic of the industry — designing for the fantasy and fitting the sample size — that my own experience of not fitting into things didn't translate into professional intention until much later. That intention came gradually, through meeting my customers and getting older. Through caring less about what fashion said and more about the specific woman in front of me who wanted to feel good in her clothes.
It was only when I started genuinely engaging with my customers — meeting them, hearing from them, understanding who they actually were — that I realised the sizing question was one I could answer. Not just as a designer, but as a woman who has spent a good part of her life in a complicated relationship with the way clothes fit her body.
What size inclusive actually means at Maya Prass
Size inclusivity means going beyond the commercially standard size range — the small to extra large, the 32 to 38 or 40 — and offering a wider variety of bodies access to the same clothing. At Maya Prass that means sizes 32 to 46, in the same carefully chosen fabrics across every size. We don't substitute or skimp on fabric as sizes increase. And because everything is made to order, every size is available all the time — we never have to decide how many units to allocate per size, which means a 44 or a 46 is never the first to disappear.
The proof of whether that actually works is in the garments themselves. The Clara Caftan Dress is the style I'm most proud of in this regard. It's the one piece in the collection that I can say with complete confidence works from a size 32 to a size 46 — and I know this not from theory but from sales. I've sold the Clara in every single size it comes in. I have repeat customers in a size 32 and repeat customers in a size 46 who keep coming back for it. That doesn't happen by accident.
What makes it work is a combination of elements that create a considered dress with real bodies in mind. The empire line — the seam that sits just under the bust — falls in a place that is genuinely flattering across a wide range of bodies, and because of how we've graded the pattern from the smallest to the largest size, it stays exactly where it should regardless of size. The sleeve hits at the elbow, which works on any arm. The V neckline opens the chest beautifully and can be adjusted for customers who want a little more coverage. The maxi length gives the right amount of coverage below. And the way the dress skims rather than clings means it moves with the body rather than against it. Every choice we've made for this dress has been a deliberate one.
What matters most
Beyond the practicalities of sizing and fit, what I most want to offer extended size customers is something simpler: a welcoming space where every body type belongs, where there is no discomfort in asking for what you need, and where the number on the label is just information — not a judgement.
I want customers to feel confident coming back. Confident that the size that worked last time will work again. Confident that the silhouette they love will be there next season. Confident that they are not an afterthought in this brand but one of the reasons it exists in the shape it does.
But more than anything, I want my customers to feel joy when they put the garments they've chosen for themselves on. I want them to feel like they've bought themselves a gift that they get to enjoy every day that they wear it — and that the investment they made, both in purchasing and in waiting for it to be made especially for them, was worth it.
Enjoy our full collection of inclusive pieces, sizes 32 to 46, is at mayaprass.com.
