There was one straight-sized model at Karoline Vitto’s go-sees. “She was great,” says Chloe Rosolek, who cast the designer’s spring/summer 2025 presentation. “But I think her agent might have misread the brief a little.” Rosolek wondered if it was perhaps the first time a traditionally sample-sized model had been in an environment where they were made to feel like the odd one out. “It was just her and all these curvaceous baddies in a waiting room. I bet that’s never happened before because it’s often the other way around. It’s worth considering how it makes them feel… knowing they’re being used as a tick-box exercise. But here’s the thing: it’s not tokenism with Karoline. It’s an authentic brand designed for these women.”
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In the short space of two years, the Brazilian-born Vitto has managed to do what so many other designers will spend decades engineering: she has created a brand that actually means something to people. So much so, in fact, that a considerable number of her spring/summer 2025 cast have flown into London on their own dime. “This is what I mean!” Rosolek says. “Even though we can’t pay them the biggest of fees, established girls from New York are willing to come in and support Karoline. They want to be a part of the show because someone is finally doing something for them.” Among this season’s line-up is the make-up artist Raisa Flowers. She was a guest at Vitto’s autumn/winter 2024 show in Milan – where models including Ashley Graham and Ceval wept backstage – and has paid for her own tickets to appear on Vitto’s catwalk. Flowers joined Molly Constable, Tsunaina Limbu, Nyakier Buong, Yumi Nu, and Fernanda Liberti. “One of the girls we saw in castings was a size 18 before losing weight because of some health issues,” Rosolek adds. “It was around that time that she started walking for [a storied Parisian house]. She’s not been used since regaining her health and putting some of the weight back on.
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The casting director says the hidden prevalence of Ozempic has had a direct impact on the number of models attending go-sees. “We used to see far more girls that were pushing size 14, 16 and 18, but a lot of curve models have now become mid-size.” This is part of the reason Rosolek and Vitto mounted open castings and more than 100 people have since come through, including Angellika Morton, one of the most well-known plus-size models from the ’90s. “She’s such a boss, which is fab, because this brand is about women, not girls. You look at most runway shows and all the models are 18 years old, whereas the woman who shops Karoline can see themselves on the catwalk.” But of course not all women are born models. “We look for fierce walkers,” Rosolek says. “Brands and casting directors don’t tend to take these curve models as seriously when it comes to walking because they assume that if someone’s heavier they can’t carry themselves as well.” (The “KV strut” is one to be reckoned with.)
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Much – and yet not enough – has been made of the fashion industry’s backslide towards size zero. My colleagues at Vogue Business found that plus-size models (US 14+) made up just 0.8 per cent of those cast across all four fashion cities during the autumn/winter 2024 season. “There has 100 per cent been a decline in the number of brands asking me to cast bigger bodies models,” Rosolek says. “And when they do, most of them just want the traditional hourglass figure. We have women of different proportions walking for Karoline because she knows how to make clothes that support them.” Her first standalone collection at London Fashion Week since graduating from Fashion East in 2023, Vitto took inspiration from Brazil’s annual Iemanjá festival, which sees local people sink flowers into the shoreline as an offering to the goddess of the sea. “It’s been a beautiful process,” the designer says. “We started with 20 looks but might add some more because we keep seeing so many amazing girls.”
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A highlight, Vitto said, was when Beatrice Aol, who last season opened for Vivienne Westwood, entered the room. “She told us that this was the most exciting casting she had ever been to, and that Karoline was her dream client,” Rosolek says. “I think it’s about these women feeling welcome, and walking into a room that has been carved out just for them. This has been one of the most enjoyable casting processes I’ve ever undertaken and it’s been so beautiful to see people of all different body sizes come in and not have any awkward interactions. There’s not been one example of someone coming in and not being able to fit into the samples.” Vitto will be praised for her inclusive approach to casting, but I wonder if ‘exclusive’ might be a more appropriate term – it takes a lot to be a Karoline Vitto girl. Rosolek and Vitto will be celebrating their success with an intimate and, yes, exclusive dinner this weekend.
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