Once upon a time, a 24-year-old curvy Black woman walked into the office of a national radio station wearing a grey pencil skirt and a matching sweater. Another Black woman—a lovely woman, by the way—gave her a tour around the office where she’d potentially work. However, at the end of the tour, the woman told the 24-year-old that her outfit wasn’t appropriate. Little did she know that she’d be viewed as a woman trying the “office siren look.”
Curvy women are often sexualized—regardless of what we wear. Even the blandest pair of sweatpants can be read as seductive. There’s rarely space for us to just exist in our bodies without scrutiny. The reality of not being able to show up in normal clothes without drawing attention to yourself is an invasive experience that often causes anxiety about one’s presentation.
Layer that with corporate American culture—built without us in mind—and you create a new burden: the constant, exhausting awareness of how our bodies are perceived in “professional” spaces. The double consciousness of being a curvy woman in a professional space easily overfills our minds with questions like “Do I look professional enough?” or “Is this too tight?” My favorite? “Is this even appropriate for the office?”
I’d ask myself this constantly, while the mirror would literally be reflecting a 20-something-year-old wearing slacks from H&M and a button-down. But because these hips have never lied, I, too, have never felt the comfort of just being able to show up to work without someone staring a little too hard at me, disturbed by my body.
When I came across a plethora of videos discussing the office siren look on TikTok, my first reaction was that it would never work for curvy women. The conversation rarely dares to include us. It’s automatically a red flag for many to see curves coming around the office corner—and an even brighter flag to the corporate world when you’re a woman of color.
The Office Siren Look on Curves
When the office siren look conversation took off on TikTok a few weeks ago, this woman wasn’t surprised at the exclusion of women with curves. Shocked? No. Annoyed? Absolutely.
Time and again, curvy and plus size women have had to fight simply to be seen as normal—even while wearing the most everyday clothes. If we wear short shorts or tap into the uber mini-skirt trend we’ve seen come and go, the response is always different than it would be for a slimmer woman. This understanding immediately lays the foundation for us to not even be considered when the “office siren” conversation took over TikTok, after a woman was reportedly fired for wearing an outfit deemed “too sexy” for the workplace.
The think pieces were all over my FYP, with the resounding agreement that wearing sexy clothes to the office is obviously and immediately a ‘no.’ But what about the fact that women with curves literally get looked at as an office siren even in slacks?
Pencil skirts, slacks, and blouses that fit our bodies well can easily be misconstrued as “too tight,” “too revealing,” or “inappropriate,” when in reality, we’re often wearing the very items outlined in corporate dress codes. Curvy women can barely wear the appropriate work culture fashion without getting stares—or making others uncomfortable with their bodies.
This experience can subconsciously lead curvy and plus-size women to withhold themselves from applying to certain companies, or even from showing up fully as ourselves at the jobs we currently hold. Whether it affects your ability to confidently speak in front of your peers at work, or just walk around the office and build relationships and network, there is an emotional and psychological toll that wears and tears at many curvy women when it comes to how we are perceived and received in the office.
There is nothing worse than thinking that you’re showing up professionally to do your job the best you can—only to get called into the manager’s office because someone felt offended by being able to see that you are curvy through your work clothes. If you dress frumpy, you’re not showing up for the job you want or the future you wish to build. If we dress appropriately, we run the risk of not “looking professional enough” because our hips, breasts, and thighs are bigger than our colleagues. The drama never ends.
We won’t speak for every woman, but it’s a familiar truth for many curvier professionals: the moment they embrace standard corporate fashion, the gaze—and often, the judgment—shifts. They immediately get called out for wearing an office siren look, when in actuality they’re just showing up in normal, fashionable workwear.
When I walked out of that radio station, I couldn’t shake the audacity of her comment about my outfit. My Express grey pencil skirt was below the knee—always my go-to for interviews. I was entering the workforce, eager to land a full-time job. I’d worn that exact skirt countless times without issue. But at that moment, I realized her issue wasn’t with the outfit. It was with the body wearing it. A slimmer woman in that same look would’ve passed without comment. That much, we know.
What are your thoughts on the office siren looks for plus size women? Let us know in the comments!
