Imagine being told you’ll have to limit your dreams because of your size.

That’s what our cover girl Charlie Reynolds is facing as she contemplates a career in musical theatre after modelling. “There are people telling me ‘You’ll never be an ingenue,’” Reynolds shares with fashion news director Odessa Paloma Parker in “Alpha Charlie” (page 60).

The fashion world has been much more welcoming. Soon after charging into modelling last year, Reynolds landed a Sephora campaign—a stellar beginning, especially for someone who is far from the standard model size. She also appears in an anti-sex-trafficking campaign for Covenant House called Shoppable Girls.

On shoot day, fashion editor Eliza Grossman first put Reynolds in the most body-con piece on her clothing rack: a geometric print dress by Tanya Taylor. “Nobody was trying to hide what my body actually looks like,” remarks Reynolds. “As a plus-size model, you go into things almost expecting that they’re going to do what they can to keep you to the industry standard.”

So why, then, did we choose an image for our cover where her body is obscured? Especially when we open ourselves to the criticism that we are intentionally hiding her size? The truth is that we used the same criteria we do for choosing every cover shot: engaging energy, a strong fashion message, room for cover lines and overall visual punch. Reynolds lying on a carpet playing with a Polaroid camera checked all our boxes and delivered the perfect scenario for a timely headline.

Sisters Aleena, Aleezeh and Naseeha Khan are also familiar with “soul-crushing” messaging. Being of Pakistani heritage, they rarely saw themselves reflected in beauty ads. “You then feel like you’re less important than another person,” remarks Aleena in “Sister Act” (page 48). The trio have hit back with CTZN Cosmetics, a U.K.-based line offering a truly universal range of nude lip colours. The satisfaction that comes from going up against brands that once excluded them must feel sweet.

Rising up and celebrating your uniqueness is something we admire here at FASHION. Which is why we had to ask Mei Pang about her 80 tattoos (“Skin Deep,” page 46). The 23-year-old makeup artist and beauty influencer spent her early years trying to fit in with Western standards of beauty, but now the totally bald and much-inked Pang says she has never felt prettier.

All three of these stories should remind us that darkness often leads to light. Or as artist Kristine Moran phrases it, Utopias Come in Waves. That’s the title of her art exhibition at Toronto’s Daniel Faria Gallery, which served as the backdrop for “Twinning Streak” (page 68). Moran started swimming daily four years ago, and the themes of waves, swim caps and movement appear in her paintings. “Swimming becomes a metaphor for the human will to push through adversity—the desire to survive,” the exhibition notes say. It’s a sentiment that is so right for the challenges we now face.

You’ll notice that we are still running a travel story— “Treasure Hunting: Wellington” (page 82)—even though as of press time, most flights were grounded. So please file this piece away for the better days ahead, when the next wave of utopia rolls in.