“It was never my dream to be a model,” Jocelyn Corona said when she visited the Jezebel studio last week. “It was more like to be like a Miss Universe… I was always thinking that I was too big to be a model, so I was never even thinking of the possibility to become one.”
Meet Jocelyn Corona, the Mexican model who’s changing the curve game. She’s spent only four years in the industry, but she was the most-booked curve model this past New York Fashion Week, and the first curve model ever to walk the runway for designers like The Blonds and Rebecca Minkoff. “I think it was my best Fashion Week for so long,” she says, “not because of all the shows that I was in—just to see the diversity in every single runway.”
But while designers are slowly seeing the need to become more size-inclusive, Corona was quick to point out that “curve modeling or the plus size industry is not a trend.” Earlier in her career, she said, she struggled to find positive role models who looked like her and celebrated their curves and individual beauty. Now, she uses her Instagram to send messages of body positivity to her 44.7k followers. “When you’re a teenager, you want someone to relate to, so I think it was very important for me to [tell] them I’m not perfect but this is what I do,” she said. “Once you [see] all the messages that they send to you—[I’m] actually like doing something for someone that I don’t even know and it feels just right.”