At 23, Crystal Renn is a size 12 and, at the same time, the highest paid plus-size model of our times. She’s been featured on the cover of Vogue and other prestigious magazines, and has modeled for Jean-Paul Gaultier and Dolce & Gabbana. However, she’s the first to admit that it’s just recently and ever so slowly that the fashion industry has started taking heed of anyone bigger than a size 0.

Renn has just launched her autobiography, the Guardian informs. She may seem a bit too young to be doing that, but, believe it or not, before she was the kind of model all regular women can look up to and relate, she too was stick thin. Discovered at 13 and immediately told she needed to lose weight, Renn lived on nothing but lettuce and Diet Coke for months, until she managed to become smaller than a size 0. She was about to take fashion by surprise when she came to the realization she was killing herself, she now recalls.

She gained 32 kg and got back to good health – surprisingly enough, her success has been even more amazing since that moment. “When I started modeling in 2002 – and to a slightly lesser degree, today – the look of the moment was nearly skeletal. Starting in the early 1990s with the rise of Kate Moss and of heroin chic, the fashion industry fell in love with depressed-looking, emaciated girls.” Renn recalls of how things were when she first started working in the industry.

Now, things are starting to change and, clearly, her case is perhaps the most adequate example, since she has come to know more fame and success as a full-figured woman than as a skeletal, young girl. Of course, that’s not to say that the fashion industry is about to change overnight, since stick-thin models continue to be in high demand. Designers, at the same time, continue to create clothes only for same-sized, skinny customers, but, at least, Renn points out, a change has begun.

A change has certainly begun, as Lizzie Miller’s case, the one we’ve been telling you about a few days ago, also shows. Her photo was featured in Glamour magazine and the reaction to it on behalf of the public has been so good the mag has announced it will include a whole new feature just with her in the upcoming issue. While the feature is being worked on, size-0 critics are getting ready to welcome the return of the regular woman to fashion, and to hail the advent of a new era: one where all beauty is honored, no matter the size.