Now Topshop’s changing rooms go gender-neutral
Topshop has made its changing rooms gender-neutral following pressure from transgender customers.
The fashion retailer, owned by billionaire tycoon sir philip Green, has updated its policy after a number of shoppers complained they had been refused entry to female changing rooms.
Travis Alabanza, who identifies as ‘trans feminine’ and prefers to be addressed using the pronoun ‘they’, was shopping in one of the brand’s Manchester stores and went to try on dresses in the female changing rooms.
Alabanza – who was wearing a dress and make-up – was searching for clothes with colleagues for a work event when they were told they had to go downstairs to use the men’s fitting rooms.
The shopping assistant then called a manager who told Alabanza they were not able to let them in as women were in their underwear. The blogger said they felt uncomfortable trying on women’s clothing among men, telling Buzzfeed: ‘I said, “I’m not going to be safe down there. What do you want me to do?” And they just kind of shrugged.
‘Naturally I was already getting looks and stares as I always do, and that is the kind of thing you’re used to when you’re trans, but I think when I was stopped at the changing room, I noticed the stares even more.
‘ I was quite upset. It ruined my day. It’s just been a whole stretched-out thing when all I wanted was to go into Topshop and go out.’
Alabanza received a flood of responses on Twitter from transgender customers who had similar experiences.
one, who had been emailing Topshop for some time, posted an email chain in which parent company the Arcadia Group said it had edited its policy to make the changing rooms inclusive of all genders.
A spokesman for Topshop, which was founded in 1964 and has 620 stores in more than 40 countries, said: ‘All Topshop and Topman customers are free to use any of the fitting rooms located within our stores.’ But the policy has caused upset among other shoppers.
A discussion on Mumsnet attracted almost 600 responses in only 15 hours, with one concerned parent writing: ‘Another shop to strike off the list. Am I the only one worried this is past the point of no return?’
Another said: ‘That’s Topshop scored off my list of places to shop with teenage daughters.’ A third added: ‘But Topshop is full of little girls trying on clothes behind a flimsy curtain.
‘Fine to have same sex facilities if they are single, hard-walled, proper door cubicles that provide ceiling-to-floor covering but they aren’t and I’m sure they won’t be funding new ones.’
others praised the retailer. one mother said: ‘ Good. It’s about time. Most changing rooms are monitored anyway. And women are just as big pervs as men.’
Topshop’s change in policy follows the announcement in september by John Lewis that it was doing away with gendered boys and girls clothing.
Many Topshop fitting rooms have only a curtain to conceal shoppers from the gaze of other customers, although the flagship oxford street branch does have doors that provide greater privacy.
‘Past the point of no return’