First rule about Tight Club…
The days are growing shorter and the air smells like freshly-sharpened pencils. After Labor Day, bare legs are verboten if you adhere to Miss Manners, so what’s a girl to do? Tights, baby. Tights.
Finding a decent pair of plus size tights is a bit of a challenge. Sometimes tight purveyors make gigantically long tights with a larger waistband, as though their customers are plus size giraffes. I’m 5’9″ and even I shake my head at these ridiculous things. Also, in theory, tights should be more hearty than your average silken hosiery, and yet somemanufacturers send out tights which are dear and apparently made of knit gossamer and spider webs. Therefore, even though I LOVE all of those choices, I tend to shy away from places like Hips And Curves, Tights Online and We Love Colors. Mopie is delicate enough to pull that off, but I cannot. More specifically, my ass, thighs and the rubbing action of said thighs cannot.
Mopie and I met up with BFDivas Sony, Elise and Marie Denee for an Igigi free-for-all and Elise was very taken with my hot pink tights. “Promise me you’ll do a tights post. PROMISE!” she insisted. And here I thought it was just me. Here’s the advice I gave her: shop where maiden aunts and librarians shop. No kidding! The venues may not have the sexy colors but their tights wear like iron and go through dozens of washings with nary a pilled inner thigh.
Here are my top picks for sturdy, well-fitting tights:
- Catherine’s. Most fatshionistas flutter their eyelids at the thought of walking into this store, with its applique’d polyester dresses and matronly sportswear, but their hosiery is amazingly resistant to runs. The colors are pretty boring however, black tights are the workhorses of a fall wardrobe and I get all of mine from Catherine’s. (Sizes up to 7x)
- Woman Within/Roamans/One Stop Plus/Jessica London: If you buy from them, you’ll forever get a million paper catalogs in the mail, but oh the colors! Orange! Teal! Cranberry! Purple! You automatically get an heir and a spare with their 2 pack deal, so it’s the best bang for your tight dollar, even if they don’t wear quite as long as the boring options from Catherine’s. They have cool sparkly Lurex too. (Sizes up to 8x)
- Avenue: Inconsistent sizing (sometimes I get the weirdly long or super small pair) and word on Fatshionista is that they changed the quality of their standard tights but I still can’t resist things like the double diamond pointelle. The hot pink pair of tights that prompted this post came from Avenue. (Sizing up to EE, which fits 320-375 lbs)
- Torrid: Pretty one note for selection (and that note tends to be goth). Even though I’ve given up on their plain black tights, Torrid is still my automatic go to for statement hosiery like fishnets. Huge caveat: they have the crappiest waistbands imaginable, and the runs/rips always start there, but I usually just go MacGyver and either cut off the waistband entirely and hold them up by wearing a pair of Spanx over them or cut the legs off and use a garter belt. Torrid gets extra credit for using models of size in their photos. (Sizing up to 3x/4x, which means practically nothing)
What did I miss? Where are the amazing tights to be found? Hit us up in the comments for your juicy secrets!
Full disclosure: Neither BFD nor I received any compensation to endorse these products!
Posted by Weetabix
Filed under: Fashion, Fat Positive, Weetabix
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I buy my tights from JC Penney, I think the brand is Hue. Brown, black, navy…boring but functional for work. They only carry them in fall and winter, so you have to stock up in-season. They wear really well and last a couple of seasons, or until I snag them on something really ridiculously pointy.
I’m looking for some of the thicker tights, I don’t know if they are wool or cotton? But I’m sure I’ve seen them on straight sized girls before and I want some.
Sternlein makes super-thick cotton tights up to a 4x. I’m a 24/26 and I bought a pair to wear around Paris in December; they did the trick! They kept me warm, looked great, wore well (no sagging), and are still in winter use two years later (which makes the ~$30 I paid for them more palatable).
What do you mean by your advice to “shop where maiden aunts and librarians shop”? I am a librarian, and I do not conform to the prevalent stereotypes about my profession–nor do most of my colleagues!
As for me, I like Talbot’s tights. So I guess I do conform to the dowdy librarian stereotype a little…
What I want is black tights that don’t fade after a couple of washes. And that fit my 5’3 frame without a lot of bunching at the legs. I have a couple pairs from Avenue but the sizing is off and they faded from black to a mucky gray in no time.
I’d be interested in any company that makes plus-size petite tights. I am so tired of the bunching!
I like to shop at http://www.sockdreams.com My favorite tights are actually “one size” tights, if you can believe that. I am a big girl, and they fit me. What’s that brand name? I’m at work, and they block Sock Dreams because it is “racy.” **rolls eyes** Anyway, do a search for “space dyed” tights, I believe, and you will find them.
Catherine’s is not as bad as it used to be. I have been able to find a lot of nice things there in the last couple of years. They also have many more items in natural fabrics. Stylish leather coats, Right Fit jeans (which I love), crop pants, summer dresses. Yes, there are still some of the other “matronly” items, but take a closer look.
I am not affiliated with Catherine’s in any other way than being a customer. :)
A woman is kicked out of a nail salon after refusing to pay a $5.00 fat tax, and what are we doing? Why, we here at BFD are too busy talking about CLOTHES, AGAIN, to care.
I’m sure when the first fat lynching occurs, we’ll be talking about matching socks to a dress or some nonsense. Way to prioritize.
A post about the nail salon incident is already forthcoming, Ivo, so maybe you can calm the hell down. Or start your own blog, where you can ignore fashion to your heart’s content!
I would also like to add that I’m not a professional blogger, and can’t always post about everything as soon as it happens. I’m an overworked college teacher whose semester just started, and A) I’m really busy, and B) my students are my priority at the moment. I think your tone is really inappropriate. Feel free to find another blog that meets your blog-reading needs. I’m sure there are plenty.
DR. IVO RRRROBOTNIK SHALL NOT BE DENIED! I WILL CRRREATE SOME KIND OF CANNON THAT SHOOTS LAMPREYS AND PORNOGRAPHY AND THEN WHAT?
Actually, how about I just apologize for being a total dichebeast? Because I was a total dickbeast.
Sorry.
Thanks Dr. Ivo. We all have bad days!
Me thinks Dr. Ivo never needed to buy tights for business wear. To me, this is valuable info! I just went on-line and bought the Catherine’s ones for work. Next up, I’ll be buying some in fun colors for play.
Thanks so much for writing this!
Hmm…now what colors to buy…decisions, decisions…
I’m a librarian too and though where I work we’re not encouraged to wear what my boss calls “club wear” we’re also permitted to wear jeans and casual clothes as long as they are tasteful. So that would probably rule out orange tights, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t wear them ever!
As for me, I like the Hue brand as well. I have a lovely gray pair and a fun blue and gray houndstooth pair from hue and used to have a lovely dark purple pair before I wore them out. I must say though that I do disagree with the notion that some fat women do not need extra fabric. If you’re short or medium height, I could see it being a problem, but as a fellow fat 5’9er, I have to say that when it comes to hosiery, I absolutely need the extra length. Even when I was about 20 lbs thinner in high school (a pretty modest looking size 12) I needed to wear the Q size panty hose because every other size was too short on me, the hose literally would not pull all the way up. There’d be about 2-3 inches of space between my crotch and where the crotch of the panty hose would start and it was ridiculously uncomfortable, not only for the obvious reason, but because this kind of ill fit spawned the absolute worst chaffing ever. I used to think this happened because my thighs were so big, but a thin friend of mine who was about 2 inches taller told me she always had the same problem. So really, I’m all about the extra fabric, and the control top is nice because it helps keep everything in place. I don’t mean my belly, I mean, it really helps with keeping the tights where they damn well belong, something I never thought was an issue until I tried a pair without it and they kept falling down my bum!
I thought this post was really helpful. Fat discrimination comes in many forms, and I think talking about all of them is important. The fact that the BFD covered fashion AND events like the nail salon incident is one of the reasons I enjoy reading it so much.
Also, I am tickled pink that you used the phrase “an heir and a spare”.
So am I. It’s one of my favorite phrases picked up from trashy romance novels.
I want to wear tights but I do have a question.. am I the only one who gets incredibly, awfully, uncomfortably sweaty in tights? I feel like if I so much as spend an evening wearing tights I end up feeling terribly gross afterward, and I don’t like it so I’ve basically stopped wearing tights or anything I need to wear tights with- And I’d love for that to be different.
I’m going to mention sock dreams again, because they are awesome.
The only problem with them is the sizing can be a little hit or miss, I’ve gotten things that will stretch forever, and others that I ended up giving to a thin friend because there was no way in hell they’d fit, despite being labeled plus sized. In my orders with them, it was only one way too small product, so not horribly common.
Oh and Jasmine, Sock Dreams has thick cotton tights: http://www.sockdreams.com/products/sock-collections/plus-sized/foot-traffic-combed-cotton-tights
http://www.sockdreams.com/products/sock-collections/plus-sized/eg-smith-leg-therapy-solids
Don’t get me started on tights or other hosiery. Being 6’2″ it is difficult for me to find a pair that fits. I was superthin (115 lbs)in high school but I still needed to buy the Q sized for the extra farbic to add length in the legs to try to avoid the crotch void. (What was I supposed to do with that void? Keep my keys in there? But I digress.) But along with the extra length in the legs came the extra length in the rise so I had to pull the waistband up to my armpits. Not comfortable. Not fun.
Now 20+ years and 100+ lbs later I’m still buying the Q (or more) size. They still don’t fit quite right and still not fun.
Target has some tights for in-betweenies, but nothing for larger plus sizes. I am 5’6″ and wear a size 18/20 on the bottom and their 1x/2x Merona tights fit me pretty well. And they’re only $6 a pair. But again, I don’t think they make anything bigger. At least not that they have in the slightly sketchy, always picked-over Brooklyn Target.
Ahem… as a librarian, I ask you to think again about that stereotype!
I love We Love Colors. I wear the living daylights out of their Lycra blend tights, they never die!
E.G. Smith! That’s the brand from sockdreams.com that I was thinking of. Thanks, Danifae.
Help! I desperately need good quality sheer nylon tights in a plus size but cannot find anywhere that will ship to Australia. The only ones I can get ehre are horrible and they pill and hole very quickly at the thigh, as well as sag in tehc rotch. No thanks!
Can anyone recommend somewhere online for plain tights with international shipping?
K
Thanks for these great suggestions. I’ve bought a lot of clothing online, but never tights.
This made me laugh, but it’s true:
“as though their customers are plus size giraffes.”
We’re beautiful curvy women, not safari creatures!