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Microprocessing
Clothes-Fitting Technology Could Save Online Shopping
A deep dive into an overlooked innovation
I recently bought a pair of pants. This should be unremarkable, but pants shopping is such an absolute nightmare for most women that it is, for many of us, a significant life event. It’s an investment of money and often requires a significant investment of time, emotional energy, and space in the group chat in which the relentless relitigation of the value of a particular pair becomes the main topic of conversation for… too long.
Anyway, I bought these pants on Madewell’s website, which has a quiz you can take to determine your size in that particular item. The size it recommended was one size down from the size I wear in another brand, Everlane, so I didn’t believe it. No way did I fit into that size. I ordered my usual, which, when they arrived, were — you guessed it — way too big.
Quizzes like the one I took that correctly insisted I size down are a well-intended solution to fixing this problem, which can be annoying, expensive, and even environmentally unsound, thanks to the emissions from shipping and the impact of making the clothes to begin with. Though it may seem like a minor innovation to some — perhaps especially to those who don’t mind a loose-fitting cargo pant — the…
