Ady del Valle grew up idolizing the fashion industry, but never saw anyone in it who looked like him. He decided to change that.
Photo by Julio Lopez.
In a small room with a kempt makeup table, a sewing machine, a ring light and a bed, Arcadio "Ady" del Valle begins his morning ritual of makeup application. His face and eyebrows must always be on before picking his outfit of the day and leaving the two-bedroom apartment he shares with his abuela (grandmother). The all-gray space is surprisingly monochromatic for such a decidedly colorful model/artist/advocate. Then again, an unconventional approach is fitting for someone on his way to becoming the fashion industry's next breakout plus-size model.
"This doesn't happen to everyone who looks like me," del Valle says reflexively. "But I need to ride this bull by the horns."
Del Valle, who is in his early 30s, was born and raised in Boston. His parents split up when he was 10, and his mother and grandmother raised Ady and his sister, Amarillis, although he remained close with his father. After high school, he trained to work as a paralegal, and when his mother moved out of town, he stayed with his abuela so that she wouldn't be on her own in the city. Growing up, the young del Valle had always been obsessed with fashion: Project Runway, America's Next Top Model, fashion films, runway shows and celebrity interviews. But he never saw anyone like him on those TV shows. How could a queer, plus-size Puerto Rican man fit into that world?
"I never thought that I could pursue something like this in real life," he says. "I didn't know how to express myself the way I wanted to." Because of his body, he grew up shy and tried not to take up space. He recounts days in his teenage years spent flipping through catalogs for KingSizeDirect, which caters to big and tall men, and enduring frustrating shopping trips where he discovered that sizing on fashionable clothes never went bigger than XXL or a 40-inch waist.
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When he was 17, del Valle went to the Gap to buy navy slacks for his high school graduation. Months earlier he had been able to find clothes there that fit, so he was surprised when "they told me they no longer carried my size and I had to seek out big and tall men's stores, which weren't near me at all. I had to go there, spend more money and have my pants tailored to fit better."
Finding clothes has always been hard for plus-size people, especially attire that makes them look good and feel good without emptying their wallets. The "," or markups for plus-size customers, has sometimes been rationalized by retailers that claim more fabric and materials are needed to produce larger clothing.
"I remember paying $60 for big and tall Levi's, when it only costs $40 for smaller sizes," says del Valle.
In recent years, more options have become available and accessible thanks to brands like Torrid, MVP Collections and ASOS, but while in terms of race and gender, the industry is still lacking size diversity. There's been some progress. Larger women like supermodel Tess Holliday have made it onto magazine covers, and plus-size men like Zach Miko and Kelvin Davis have booked modeling gigs for brands such as Target's Goodfellow & Co label. But del Valle, who wears size XXXXL or larger, is still a self-made anomaly in the world of fashion.
