The research of fixed "sizes" or "measures" to

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rêt-à-porter or Ready-to-Wear has been coined by the fashion critic Jean Claude Weill in 1949 to clearly identify and differentiate the " new Fashion ", that was booming in UK and USA, respect to the well-established and aristocratic “ Parisian Fashion ”. The aim of Weill was undoubtedly to give a new definition of the up-coming Fashion system, which was breaking the rules of the traditional European "Haute Couture", considered as the "Ancien Régime" in the rest of the world. The revolution of Prêt-à-porter was wide and impressive: no longer necessary endless sessions in the tailoring workshops reserved exclusively to a rich clientele, no longer needed "unique piece" dresses/incredible outfits designed by talented designers just for their commissioners.



The revolution of Prêt-à-porter nurse database lays in just one word: size . What could have been more revolutionary and more innovative at that time rather than "sizes"? The availability of garments in fixed sizes for everyone brings to reality the concept of Democratization of Fashion, auspicated by the theories of the North American economist and sociologist Thorstein Veblen, as well as of The German writer and cultural critic Walter Benjamin.



build on products (eg fashion, accessories, industrial design, interior) that would fit and follow the need of human beings is something that has always been crucial through the centuries for many intellectuals, philosophers and artists.



Leonardo da Vinci for example designed the renowned Vitruvian Man more than 500 years ago. The drawing, which is kept in Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice, depicts a man in two superimposed positions with his arms and legs apart and inscribed in a circle and square. The aim of this drawing is not only to represent the ideal human body proportions according to the treatise De Architectura of the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius, but to reestablish Man, and not God, at the center of the entire Universe. Thanks to this drawing and to the philosophy of the Renaissance age, man becomes the unit of measure for everything: for architecture, for objects of everyday use, for dresses itself.