The Summer Bikinis Got Smaller

Written by The Washington Post

 

Did bikini bottoms get smaller this summer? The short answer? Yes. (Get it? “Short”?)

You may have noticed it on swimwear-heavy TV such as “Bachelor in Paradise” and “Love Island,” where the cheekies got cheekier and the number of thongs crept up. (Get it? “Crept up”?)

Searches for “Love Island bikini” on Google spiked in early July. And on beaches and at pools, smaller bottoms have spilled out into the general population. (Get it? “Spilled out?” I’ll stop.)

Thongs are, perhaps unsurprisingly, not for everyone. But some swimwear designers report that there are customers who will wear nothing else.

When Hayley Segar launched Onewith swimwear in 2021, she offered classic medium-coverage bikini bottoms. After her designs began to circulate on social media, she heard from customers who wanted more teenie-weenie in their bikini.

“The only comment we got was, ‘Thongs, thongs, thongs, thongs, where are your thongs?’” Segar said.

By 2023, Segar realized that she had to act fast to meet demand. She hastily modified an existing full-coverage bottom and rushed it to the factory. “I literally told my technical designer ‘just chop off the cheeks,’” she said. That design, called the Huntington, has remained one of her best sellers.

“Full coverage is dying,” said Elizabeth Claire Taylor, CEO of the plus size swimwear company Curvy Beach. When she founded the company in 2017, she never planned on offering thongs. Her customers gravitated toward high-waisted bottoms with full posterior coverage.

But two years ago, she introduced a cheeky cut. It was a hit. In February, the company debuted its first thong. It sold out.

Taylor has many customers who will never even consider wearing a thong. “When you go from booty-covered to thong, you encounter things like butt acne,” Taylor said. “You are entering into a vulnerable territory, and I think you’re either open to it or you’re not.”

She’s encouraged by the increased demand for a variety of sizes. “To me, in the current political climate of this country, it is a way of practicing body autonomy,” she said.

Isabelle McKay, the founder of the swimwear brand Isabelle Meira, doesn’t sell thongs but has noticed a significant uptick in demand for more-revealing higher-waisted cheeky bottoms.

“Five years ago we’d sell probably 70 percent full-coverage,” she said. “Now I’d say we probably sell 70 percent cheeky.”

McKay sees a connection between wider demand for clothes inspired by the ’80s and ’90s, when higher waists and narrower cuts were in vogue. That could also explain that while bikini bottoms have shrunk, more modest tankini tops are also having a major moment.

It may seem counterintuitive, but some women have found that less coverage can be more flattering.

“Higher on the hip, it just makes more of a curve, it makes the legs look a lot longer and slimmer. It’s about creating optical illusions rather than covering more,” said McKay. “Sometimes covering more can almost look less flattering because it’s actually just a bigger expanse of fabric.”

Segar, who spent eight years selling wedding dresses in Connecticut, agrees. “I learned that back in bridal,” she said, “They would say ‘I want to be covered.’ And they’d end up going with a super strapless skin-baring gown and they’re like ‘Wait, this is a lot better than I thought.’”

Javiera Del Pozo, a model from Los Angeles, has been creating “haul” videos in which she tries on swimsuits since 2016. For years, she’s been wearing her bikini bottoms backward as a work-around. “The front part will be smaller than the back, so I’ll get more coverage in the front and less coverage in the back,” Del Pozo said.

But this summer, she’s been able to find more suits that fit the way she likes. “One, I want a good tan,” she said. “I also want to feel comfortable. If anything, covering up makes me feel less confident.”

Heather Short, who earns money posting about plus-size fashion on her thicknstrong33 TikTok channel, agreed. “For me, I’m just more comfortable when things are cheeky and smaller because I just feel it shows more curves in my body,” she said. “You always look bigger when you wear bigger clothing, in my opinion.”

Sarah Chiwaya, a contributing editor at Refinery29 and a plus-size fashion expert, rejects “looking smaller” as a goal. But she’s happy to see that more revealing bottoms are increasingly available for more consumers.

“I’m really excited to hear that there’s actually been a trend of things getting skimpier, because it’s a pushback against conservative culture that’s been seeping into fashion,” she said. “There’s been a push to dress in a way that is traditionally flattering, which is very much a patriarchal concept about covering up what’s improper and impure.”

Indeed, online summer discourse has been roaring with arguments about “trad” femininity and the political implications of cleavage, long hair, “good jeans” and heavy makeup.

In one sense, women deciding to reveal more of their bodies runs counter to conservative notions of modesty. On the other hand, if your concept of “trad” femininity includes the tradition of courting men’s attention, then showing more skin could certainly fit that definition.

Depending on where you’re sunbathing, skimpy swimsuits are nothing new. There are beaches in Brazil or Miami where thongs have been common for decades.

So, how did narrower bottoms turn into a wider trend?

Could it be gender parity? According to GQ, this was “Speedo Summer” for men.

Or could there be an economic explanation? Is it simply cheaper for brands to make smaller cuts, in what’s known as “shrinkflation?”

Kristin Schwab, senior reporter for public radio’s Marketplace explained “shrinkflation” as a potato chip manufacturer that keeps the same size bag, but puts in fewer chips. “It appears to be the same volume but you’re really getting less product, and that’s how they cut costs,” Schwab said.

Schwab also said that such considerations could end up affecting fashion trends. “You could see how a manufacturer is like, ‘Let’s push this because it is literally less fabric for us to use.”

Edgar Dworsky, an economist who has run the watchdog site Consumer World since 1995, doubts that this is happening in the swimwear market.

“Bikini shrinkage is not something that has been on my radar,” Dworsky wrote in an email. “They are so small to start with, I can't imagine that an inch or two less fabric would make a big difference cost-wise.”

Segar said she doesn’t save any money with her manufacturer when Onewith sends more revealing designs. “I can confirm we get charged the same amount,” she said. (Prices for Onewith bikinis range from $49 to $92.)

Of course, not everyone is happy with a less-is-more approach to swim bottoms. Destiny Mellow, a health care professional from Bay Springs, Mississippi, posted a now-deleted video with the title “Confirmed: the cheeky bikini life just isn’t for me.”

The video stemmed from her frustrations while trying to find a new swimsuit for a beach vacation.

“If I were to try and swim and actually enjoy my vacation in one of those bottoms I would quite literally be flashing everyone at the pool or on the beach,” Mellow wrote in an email. “I just personally don’t feel comfortable with that much of me out in public, especially when I’m with family or in mixed settings.”

But the less-skimpy items she found in stores felt dowdy and outdated, so she’s sticking with the suits she already had in her closet. “The whole section that offered what I’d call decent coverage was giving ‘water aerobics at 5, bingo at 6.’”