The Fashion World’s A-Changing: Melissa McCarthy’s New Plus Size Line

Just as Pirelli debuted its first plus-sized model in their annual calendar (and we celebrated it in this week's issue), news emerges that our favourite Bridesmaids' comedian and actress Melissa McCarthy is designing her own range of clothing for curves. US brand Sunrise will be launching her first line of casual sportswear in autumn 2015 and we can expect to see accessories and beauty following in 2016 and 2017. Her collection won't be exclusionary however, as she told WWD, “I’m doing all sizes. It’s a strange thing to stop at a certain size. Women don’t, so why should clothes?”

Fashion has long been a passion of Melissa's, having studied design at New York's famous FIT college, where she met good friend and shoe designer Brian Atwood. The pair got on extraordinarily, and Atwood convinced McCarthy to leave college and pursue her career in stand-up comedy. Whilst Brian obviously had some incredible foresight, it's always been an unfulfilled aspiration tapping the actress on the shoulder. Plus-size fashion especially, has been her raison d'etre; "I’d been looking for two, three, maybe four years for manufacturers to help us do this line,” she said. “But after we met with Sunrise, we felt they were committed to changing the plus-size game.”

Seems like times are a-changing in the fashion world, and all for the better. Between Giles Deacon for Evans and Asos Curve getting more and more fabulous, there's lot of transformation afoot. For more inspiration in plus-size shopping, check out this week's issue, and for a taster of the fabulous pieces available right now, flick through the below gallery...