Demand grows for J Lo nip ‘n’ butt ops

Jennifer Lopez. Picture / Reuters

First it was noses; then breasts, lips, even feet. Now British women are flocking to have cosmetic surgery on an entirely different area of the body.

Cosmetic surgeons are reporting a sharp increase in patients signing up for buttock augmentation.

Enamoured with the voluptuous figures of stars such as Jennifer Lopez and Beyonce Knowles, many British women are deciding to part with the cash needed to swell their lower curves, with the help of expensive silicone implants.

The phenomenal rise of the "rump plump" - demand for which has increased tenfold over the past two years, according to one high-profile Harley St physician - follows a sweeping trend on the other side of the Atlantic. The American Society for Plastic Surgery has reported a fivefold increase in the past year.

Jeya Prakash, a leading cosmetic surgeon who has been conducting buttock enhancement operations for nearly a decade, says the operation was once so unusual he did no more than one a year. Now he is conducting one enhancement a fortnight.

"Since Jennifer Lopez came into the field, people have begun to really like that South American-style shape," said Prakash. It's about the curviness and a balance of sexiness, like a Renaissance painting."

The procedure itself, which can take as little as 40 minutes, involves sliding silicone implants or fat removed from elsewhere in the body beneath muscles in the upper buttocks, making them firmer and more pronounced.

A leading surgeon would typically charge between 6000 ($15,600) and 9000 ($23,500) for the operation.

Another London-based cosmetic surgeon, Douglas Harrison, said he too had noted an increase in clients requesting buttock enhancement.

"It is relatively common now," said Harrison. "European women have become increasingly aware that nicely rounded buttocks are more attractive to the male eye than the flat ones you see on models."

- INDEPENDENT