An extraordinary woman, Viktoria

A Journey from Anorexia to Self-Acceptance with a Zest of Vegan Cakes

The way we look- the way we want to look.

The clothes we wear- the clothes we’d like to wear.

Self-image and body image are essential in our society. Nowadays, we see more and more women spreading the message of unconditional self-love. No matter what size of clothes you wear, no matter what body shape you have, you are beautiful and worthy.

While we all understand the goal, it’s not always easy to make it work for us after decades of being told that women should be thin to be beautiful and that weight loss is the most important goal. Fighting against prejudice and bullies, trying to build a new, better future for her and our daughters – let’s get acquainted with a woman making a difference, Viktoria!

Viktoria is a plus-size model, mom, entrepreneur, cake designer, and event organizer – a woman of many talents who refuses to be defined by her body size. Confronted with anorexia in her teen years, she is now spreading the message of body positivity and self-acceptance through her work and projects as a vegan cake designer and a plus-size model. Born in the Hungarian capital city, Viktoria moved to Zurich in 2019. With a daring attitude in life and business, she talks about opening her cake shop in the future. “This is maybe the next thing, but I would like to focus more on the plus-size modelling. I want to help people accept themselves for who they really are. Because I’m here, I can tell my story. I can show them.”

“I know I can dress up and look really good if I want, even if I wear a pretty big size, maybe a 46 or 48. So, it’s absolutely not about the size.”

And the reality is that one can feel and look miserable, whatever the weight. A size 38 might sound like a solid goal for some while a source of pressure to lose more weight for others. “I was a size 44; then my mom pushed me to lose weight. Her whole life is a never-ending diet. And she always told me to lose weight, lose weight… Now I understand that this happened because she never accepted herself and transferred her unhappiness to me without even noticing it. At 17 years old, I was anorexic, weighing less than 50 kg”.

 The scary moment, the realization that something is profoundly wrong and needs to be fixed, didn’t occur when Viktoria ate just an apple a day and a can of sardines. It happened when her friend, who was in the same situation, reached 41 kg and had a panic attack. “One day, she called me; she was crying, saying she needs to stop this. So we supported each other to start eating again and succeeded”. In 2016, while working as an event planner for a well-established luxury restaurant in Budapest, Viktoria started creating delicious vegan cakes. She has continued developing this business in Switzerland, now delivering to private individuals and restaurants (her site is here: NYERS).

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Most of the time, we are our own harshest critics. And whilst it might seem like it could lead to perfection, often it leads to a lack of self-love and an inability to accept oneself. “I meet many women who tell me that they never wear jeans because jeans don’t fit. I say come on, you’re a size 42; jeans fit perfectly fine on you. But they still don’t see it. And they don’t believe it. I show them how I’m wearing clothes and how confident I am, hoping they will understand by seeing me”.

“Happiness doesn’t come with a smaller size or weight loss. Happiness comes when you accept yourself.”

Viktoria’s journey as a plus-size model began by chance with a rather sad story. In the beginning, a friend – a photographer – who was often harassed and bullied because of her size, decided to start her own business as a plus-size photographer. To create her first portfolio, the two friends took photos because “she was my friend and I wanted to help her, make her happy, and I was curious about the experience. “In one picture, I was in a red dress, it was sexy and playful and the pictures turned out really, really good. Now she’s probably the most famous plus-size photographer in Hungary.”

It doesn’t have to be complicated to be memorable.

“A simple green belted dress that belonged to my mother, a pair of colourful, embroidered flared jeans, combined with a black shirt and a pair of Dr. Martens are some of the outfits I will never forget”. What’s so special about them? “I don’t know, not anything special; it’s how you feel about what you’re wearing that makes the difference. Feeling comfortable feeling confident has nothing to do with size. What we wear has a significant influence on us, but also on others. Sometimes I feel so great in the outfits that I wear that the way I interact with people around me is entirely different, much more open and serene”.

Buy only the clothes you feel great in.

We all have clothes, and outfits, that remain engraved in our memories. The adventures we had while wearing them and the emotions we felt on the day we wore them make them unforgettable. The stories our clothes tell are all unique and special. They deserve to be shared with the world, not to propagate ideals of thinness or elegance, but to make us think more carefully about the clothes we buy.

What if we only bought clothes in which we would have unforgettable moments because we felt so good in them?