Pleased to be here.
One day, when I inevitably write my incredibly sexy memoir, that’s full of trauma and hot stories about me hooking up with my wife, there will be a little sliver dedicated to December 2021. It might be five pages, it might be an entire chapter. I’m not sure yet. I just know that I will eventually need someone to know everything that I’m about to write. So here’s a start.
If you’re reading this, chances are a certain British Biscuit™ brought us together. In 2020, at the height of the pandemic, I was grasping for anything and everything. In between my debilitating dissasociative episodes, I started to make TikTok videos. I had been lurking for a solid year on the app, but I was finally faced with that painful kind of isolation, that all of us will be unpacking for years in therapy and I needed an outlet. One of the biggest comforts I had at that point in time was the album Fine Line. It changed my life. I had three music degrees that sat on my shoulders, so I decided to use them. I started posting videos talking about Harry’s music, recreating his outfits, and just generally bonding with a new community of fans that I found online. It was silly, it was renewing, and most of all- it was (and is) fucking fun.
Previously on the internet, I was populating activist spaces, dipping my toes (and then full on belly flopping) into the body positivity movement. EveningCrickets was born on Tumblr when I was 18. She started off as a “fashion” blog, where I’d post pictures of my outfits, to try and feel good about myself. Weirdly enough, it worked.
My feeds began to be full of people with bodies like mine, living full glamorous, exciting, adventurous lives and I started to see myself in new, softer ways. It was a great education in how the internet can be a mirror. How it can show you yourself in a new light. I loved that version of the internet and I wish it was the only version that existed. But it’s not. So, I decided to be a lighthouse. If I couldn’t make the internet better, I could at least offer some kind of light for other people to follow, where they knew they’d end up someplace safe and kind. That has always been the ethos of my heart and my content. It also happens to be the very ethos and brand of Harrison Elizabeth Stylish (It was inevitable, really).
I think the perfect culmination of all of these things can be found in a series I started on TikTok last year. Harry Styles was embarking on the first half of Love On Tour in North America. Leading up to the tour, I had seen a slew of videos from plus size fans worrying about what they were going to wear. They weren’t the “inspo” pictures that populate pinterest, they couldn’t see themselves and it made them feel like they didn’t belong. I knew better, so I showed them.
I started a series called “I Adore What You Wore To Love On Tour”. I describe this series as the Fashion Police, but the TPWK version. I collect pictures people send me, tag me in, or ones I find online of outfits that people wear to the concerts and I try and gas people up. I try and make them see what I see for three minutes. It’s a chance for me to help people feel good about themselves. I’m still making episodes to keep up with the latest leg of this tour, now in Europe. Come November, I’ll have been making these for about a year, and the response to these videos still never gets old. People reach out to me, daily, to tell me what it means to see themselves represented in these videos. I’ve been interviewed about this series by various podcasts and news sources and it brought a lot of new people to my content.
All of this, put me at the perfect, chaotic intersection of fandom and advocacy, which errupted in December of 2021 when Harry Styles announced his new company, Pleasing.
When Pleasing was first announced, I cried. I cried like a little baby back bitch over nail polish. I did. Because I knew that this company was going to be so much more than nail polish for a lot of people. The brand positioned itself as a company that would “Dispell the myth of a binary existence”. It was overwhelming to think about what that would mean for young Queer kids. To see, arguably, the biggest rockstar of the moment found a company that “Prioritized People and the Planet” felt like some kind of weird dream. The product photos were stunning and included some of the most diverse cast of models I’ve seen- save for one particular demographic.
My kingdom for a fat girl, Harry.
Regardless, I was still excited to support this new company, started by someone I so deeply admired.
One aspect of the Harry Styles’ fandom that is as endearing as it is terrifying, is how closely the fans pay attention to everything Harry does. They knew about Pleasing before it was officially announced because someone found papers regarding the trademark months before. They’re eager to see what he wears, what he reads, and what water bottle he uses. I’ve done this myself in recreating outfits he’s worn. I started buying color blocked suits and wide legged pants because he was wearing them and I thought they were cool. Over the various stay at home orders, fans went viral for recreating the iconic cardigan he wore to a Today show rehearsal. When he was photographed wearing a Pleasing crewneck sweatshirt, we all knew what that meant. And we were excited. I was excited. I thought I was going to get to buy a piece of this legacy, a first piece of this company that I was already rooting for. A company that was an opportunity for Harry to prove himself in a new way.
I was soaking in the promises of “this is for you” and “this is just the beginning” when a pit formed in my stomach. The brand was posting about the crewnecks, but when I questioned them about the sizing of their crewneck, they gave a non answer (and then deleted it).
Pleasing was trying to present itself as a brand with transparency, and yet they were being anything but transparent. They had promised us that this was going to be a company that prioritized all people and broke down societal standards of beauty, all while holding an ethical backbone. Surely, this meant they were going to be a size inclusive brand? Right? Why shy away from that question?
Unless they knew they had fucked up before they even really began?
As susptected, the first release of Pleasing merch was not size inclusive. It went up to a size 3X (and there are discrepancies on where the 3X was available). Maybe it’s my cancer rising sign, but I felt hurt. I felt so…..stupid. I had been out here making content about Harry Styles and how fucking wonderful I thought he was. How great his music made me feel, how his humanity was so stunning and I was building community with other fans, only to be shut out by a person that had made me feel safe.
Then, like I always do, I was sad and then I got angry. Size Inclusivity is not a new concept. The Pleasing team is lead by some of the most innovative, creative, and definitive voices in fashion right now, they knew. And for whatever reason, it didn’t matter enough for them to push for the brand to be size inclusive with the first launch. It might not have mattered to them, but it mattered to me.
I realized I had a lot of power at my disposal. I had amassed a small platform of people on TikTok, so I started making videos, I started sending out tweets, and then my wife stepped in. She had seen how upset I was over this and she used her super powers to make me a gift. She’s a graphic designer and pulled a high definition logo from Pleasing’s website and made me my own logo. One that perfectly summed up how I felt.
I did what I normally do. I posted how I was feeling to Instagram. I thought maybe some people would respond to it, but I was surprised at how hundreds of people showed up to that post. Hundreds of people shared it to their stores, reposted it to their own feeds, thousands were tagging Pleasing and their team. And then, a beautiful fucking ray of light entered my Instagram DMs.
Hannah, another Harry Styles fan, took the things I was talking about and amplified them to another realm entirely. She made a website that allowed people to send automated emails and tweets to Pleasing. They made this push for size inclusivity a reality. It wasn’t just cute shares and likes. People could actually do something about this, because Hannah gave them the tools. I was just out here using the internet like a diary, Hannah was the one that was also feeling all of the things I was, took those feelings and formed it into something productive and concrete. I was, and continue to be, in awe of them.
Of course, these are the highlights of the experience. When the discussion of size inclusivity and Pleasing went viral, a lot of people were furious that we were even entertaining the notion that Harry Styles was anything less than perfect. As much as that hurt, to have the very community I had spent so much time uplifting lash out at me, it also made sense. I recently read Everything I need I get from you: How Fangirls created the Internet as we know it by Kaitlyn Tiffany, and in it she does a deep dive on the One Direction fandom. She mentions how a lot of the time an artists’ success feels like a collaborative project for fans. They stream songs endlessly to get it on specific charts. They tweet, text, and repost to help their favorite artist win awards, or to feel supported. Their success is a reflection of the strength of the fanbase, and when that artist is criticized, it can feel like the fans themselves are being criticized. Parasocial relationships are fascinating.
Eventually, after inundating Pleasing with emails and tweets, they responded to our call for size inclusivity. They sent out a mass reply email and they posted a comment on a week old post about their crewnecks, giving again, a non-response and not once mentioning the words “size inclusivity”. This statement also implied that sustainability couldn’t exist in the same space as size inclusivity. #GaslightGateKeepGirlAlmighty
That felt like a definitive answer. They didn’t care and they weren’t going to.
And I fell apart.
I felt like I had failed. I felt fraudulent. Suddenly, all of the hate comments and messages I had gotten through this were ringing true in my ears. Maybe I was actually all of my worst fears. Maybe I was worthless? Maybe I was expecting too much of people? Maybe. At this point, I had deleted Twitter, privated my instagram, removed over 1,000 followers from my account, and locked down my TikTok. What good was I really doing on the internet?
This feeling started to bleed into my life in bigger ways. I was in this weird period of mourning. I know at the end of the day, it’s just crewnecks being created by a luxury lifestyle brand, but seeing how violently fatphobic so many people are left me scared and numb. I have only tried to be kind, to be a lighthouse, and all of my compassion and softness didn’t matter.
What good was I doing here?
I didn’t know. But my cancer rising showed up one more time. She just couldn’t let it go. She had to try one last thing. So, before the ball dropped on the New Year, she sat at her computer and cried and typed out a very long, very sensitive, very passionate email to Pleasing. I closed my computer knowing that I had done everything I possibly could to be heard.
Then, I tried to save myself.
This entire experience opened up wounds that I thought I had healed a decade ago.
It ripped me apart. I had to start stitching up the pieces. I had to find joy and comfort in myself, not some British rockstar that had no idea who the fuck I was.
One day, when I inevitably write my incredibly sexy memoir that’s full of nightmares and steamy movie makeout sessions with my wife, there will be, at least one full page dedicated to March 2022. In March of 2022, Pleasing announced their second micro collection. It was called Shroom Bloom and featured new merch, with art by Marisol Muro, modeled by Mick Fleetwood. They went up to a 5X.
As of March, Pleasing has become a size inclusive brand. Even with their latest launch, Hot Holiday, that was released earlier this week, they’ve kept up with being size inclusive, ethical, and sustainable. We’ve even seen inklings of size inclusivity in one shirt that was released for Harry’s personal merch with Harry’s House (still sleep with one eye open, Merch Traffic).
It’s been months and I still can’t exactly find the words for what it means to me to see Pleasing continue to be inclusive like this. I can’t describe how it feels to know that I was a part of that. It was confirmation that I can cultivate a lot of good in the world and it also speaks to what I’ve known all along, Harry Styles is really fucking cool.
After all of this, I’ve collected new universal truths that I protect in my heart.
Size inclusivity is so sexy, hot, cool, and absolutely the bare minimum that major brands should be practicing. It’s not up for debate.
I am very sexy, hot, cool, and absolutely deserving of the kindness and compassion that I extend to other people.
I have a really big passion for making people feel seen and loved. I think the best things come from moments when I’m extending grace to other people and I want that to be my life’s mission. I want to always strive to make people feel included, supported, and celebrated.
My wife and I talked about the last point extensively while I was wading through my hurt. My wife is this stunning creature made of fire and lipstick. She embodies fierce. One night, when I was on the couch crying about some comments I had received, she looked at me and said, “Maybe this is all just a sign to what you’re supposed to do? Maybe you need to make a space that is truly inclusive. Make your own shirts, make your own art that is actually for everyone, not just for a select few. Something that everyone can relate to and feel.”
And it was like someone had placed a cooling balm over my sunburnt heart. She knew what I needed, because while I might position myself to be a lighthouse for other people, Kyle is my lighthouse. If I can refract even a portion of the light she gives me to other people, I think I could save the entire fucking world.
There on our couch, my wife pitched the idea of &you to me. This has always been something we’ve dreamed of, since the early days of dating and finding each other, we’ve always talked about starting something like &you. A place for dreaming and creating. If I’ve learned one goddamn thing in the last year, it’s that I’m capable. If I can get Harry fucking Styles to listen to me and my friends and to change his business practices, maybe I can funnel some of that energy into creating projects that bring people together and make them feel less alone. I think I’ve got a pretty good chance of making it happen.
And while I have no idea where this endeavor will lead, or what we’ll make, I’m just really, truly, completely pleased to be here.