Evans' Pears!

This blog is probably pretty top heavy: Let's not forget the bottom half of the hourglass!

I am a lazy shopper, so I wear what I have until it falls apart. Well, luck will have it that my 2 alright fitting jeans have ripped from wearing them basically daily for several years, and I am now left with 2 not so great fitting jeans. I struggle with finding jeans due to my proportions and size, so I've dreaded having to aquire new jeans. But, my recent love for online shopping and UK blogs brought me to Evans!

At Evans, some of their clothing is marked to fit certain body-types - for example, it will say

which is just what I was looking for! A sucker for deals, I got 2 pairs of jeans on sale, and 2 pairs of jeggins.

EVANS PEAR BLACK BOOTCUT JEANS

EVANS PEAR BLACK STRAIGHT LEG JEANS

EVANS BLACK JEGGINGS

EVANS PEAR INDIGO JEGGINGS

According to the size charts, my waist would put me in 18, top hip at 22 and low hip at 24, so that was not easy to decide on. The sizing advice for pear-fitted clothing is just that you can go down a size

Yes, thank you very much, I know how much one size down is :b First of all, I don't see how that's really a huge selling point - I'm not so uncomfortable with numbers, that just the fact that I can get a smaller number, is promising in it self. If I can get a better fit with the smaller size, then yes good, but I need more guidance than just subtracting a size!
Problem is, a lot of us who need 'pear fitted' clothing have out measurements in all sorts of places - so do they mean I could size down from what my waist fits, top hip, or low hip? I mean, if I size down my low hip, I get a size 22, which is still 2 sizes off my waist.
I really wish they'd made a seperate size chart for the items that have their own sizing! It would only make sense that way...
I settled on getting size 20 for the pear shaped things, and a size 22 for the Black leggins, which had sold out in pear shape. (actually, I ran into that a lot - lots of things were sold out!)

So, here goes!
First up the Black Bootcut Pear Jeans:

You can clearly see the more pear shaped cut, as well as the boot-cut! Hopes are high...

As you can see, they are much too big. Like, I would not be able to walk without them falling down. Seems like it really ought to have been my waist I had taken a size off of! As I would say these are definitely 2 sizes (maybe even more, if I wanted a snug fit!) too big!
They are also really, really high-waisted! I don't mind the waist-band being higher than my belly-botton, but these came up to my natural waist, which would just add bulk. And of course it was additional bulk, due to the large size. I also felt like they weren't really the miracle jeans they were made out to be - the label said they would change my life! A lot of jeans have the ability to lift your butt and shape your lower pouch, but there did nothing - granted, the size might have been the issue, but the fabric didn't feel firm enough to do such thing, even in a smaller size.

The straight legged jeans were the same story, but sorry, no pictures, as they fit my mother pretty well who was visiting me when I unwrapped them, so I gave them to her before I could snap any pictures.

On to the leggins, I got both pear and non-pear, so this might allow us to compare! I haven't tried Jeggins before, but as I have lots of longish tops, and I like skinny-jeans, I thought I'd give it a shot:

Here goes the indigo pear shaped jeggins:

Well, I think they are really unflattering O.o As with regular leggins, they probably aren't made to show the bum, but as a taller girl, a lot of tunics are just that tad too short to wear with leggins, which is why I thought Jeggins were great - a middle ground. But I don't like how baggy they looked at my crotch, and the folds at the bottom of my bum were highly unflattering - they made it look way more square than it actually is.
Size wise, they are pretty good though - so they definitely run a lot smaller than the jeans! The elasticated waist wasn't so tight that it dug in, but not so loose it could fall of at all. The legs were a little tight, but I suppose that's how they are supposed to be!
I found the lenght really off putting too, though - I figured they might come up short because of the tightness in the legs: so that the vertical lenght was used more horisontally, but I measured them, and their inseam is in fact 5cm shorter than on the jeans in the same size! Is there some fashion-rule about jeggins being short is a good thing? I don't really want my socks on dispplay when wearing sneaks!

Ok, let's give the non-pear a shot:

I'd say the fit isn't actually all that different - the legs were a little looser, which only makes sense for a size larger (these were 22, wheras the indigo were 20), but surprisingly the crotch area was less baggy - I tried to make a charicarture of regular jeans vs. evans pear fit vs. my body (including my lowe belly, small bum, and large thighs).

As you can see, though my lower half is fuller than my waist, my distribution may be a little different from what many consider pear (or hourglass), so even a pretty good pear fit, will not be ideal for me.

Other than that, the most noticeable difference in fit, is the lower waist - I don't think they are actually made lower-waisted, but I think because they are smaller in the the area of the 2nd and 3rd line on my charicature, it is using the 'height' to actually wrap around my fullness, so it comes up lower, especially at the front for me. I think for someone with a bigger butt, this would not feel very secure. Since the issue for me was on the front, there wouldn't be much change of accidental flashing.

So all in all, I wasn't blown away by the fit by these 4 denims, and since it cost me a small fortune to ship them back, I am reluctant to try it out again to find the right fit!

Attempting to get a Boost!

Well, well, well, I've been trying out a well known Curvy Kate bra: The Daily Boost.

I've heard mostly skepticism about the fit on this one - in fact I can't remember seeing someone who fit it well, so I didn't plan to give it a shot.
But, with the news of the Curvy Kate Lola being based on the Daily Boost, I was suddenly very keen to find my right fit in this bra! Plus, I need a beige bra, so I gave it a shot.

I started of getting it in 34JJ, and the band was too large, but I couldn't quite decide on the cup - It was definitely too large on my smaller boob, but that's no news. So focusing on the larger boob, it could gape a bit, but with tightening the straps, I could easily be closed, and the shape was quite good.

I then went on to order a 32JJ and 32K.
The 32JJ was definitely too small:

Quadro-boobing on the larger boob
though slight gaping on the smaller

Even with the straps off, it quadro boobed on the larger boob

Even when really trying to shove my boob in there,
 it made orange-in-glass fold

The 32K was better, but still didn't look at all as big as the 34JJ had:

And still folded a bit

I'm quite puzzled, as this should only be different in band - I tried it with an extender too, to see if there was some distortion that I just couldn't feel, but it didn't change anything. The only explanation I can come up with, is that they've changed the depth vs. width from 34JJ to 32K, and that is enough to change the fit.
I might have been able to live with the orange-on-glass if the shape had been otherwise great (like I do with my Ewa Michalak bras) but it wasn't: Very odd profile, the top panel had corners going from breast to cup, and from top panel to bottom panel, and they were also very east-west pointing. All in all, it seemed like the top panel was just too large.
Very odd. I can see why this bra has caused some troubles.
I'd say the best shape for this bra, is bottom heavy in the sides, if that makes sense? Which I sort of do have, but still a bit tricky.

In conclusion, I'll go for the 34JJ in future - the Lola Babydoll probably won't be used in very support-needing situations anyway, but if needed, I can just alter that band down a little bit.

S Wiśniówka reviewed!

I've said it many times, and I'll say it again - Ewa Michalak bras are not compatible with my breasts.

So why do I keep trying? Well, because there's nothing I love more than the Ewa Michalak shape. Even when my Pl Onyks was actually unwearable wrong in size/worn out, I would still get, well, slightly disappointed when I saw my boobs in other bras.

The Ewa Michalak shape is like the holy grail to me - lifted, centered, not wider than my body, projected, not minimizing in the slightest.

And I want that. So I'll just have to work around my Ewa Issues. 

My boobs are a bit soft-ish on their surface, which means plunges aren't actually that good an idea, but so far, that has been my only Ewa option.

So when I heard that the new S-shape would be specifically made to target softer boobies, I was ecstatic  and made my order right away 

S Wiśniówka

I went for a 70KK - I have the PL Cappuccino in 75K, and it indeed looks too small these days, definitely quadro-boobing, but I reasoned that it was just due to my soft boobs not being held properly into the cup - something the S-bra would hopefully solve. 

I went for a smaller band, because the Cappuccino was loose from day 1, and definitely is now - so even though the Karmelki was too small in 70, I took a chance with this one: After all  I've heard that the Karmelki is one of the tightest.

When the bra arrived an early February morning, I popped it on right away, and well, I was not disappointed!!

Gaping on my smaller boob

Much less gaping on larger boob

It's so good! The band feels very good - I've felt like a lot of EM bras had narrow, un-stretchy seam which could be uncomfortable, but this feels really nice! And the straps are stretchy as well, which means you can tighten them enough to not slide anywhere, but they won't feel constricting.

Cup-wise, I felt very contained, but not in a full-cup kind of way - just really stable and secure. And the shape is even better than the PL's in my opinion!

Ewa had said it was pointier, which I think worried some people, but I think I can see what was meant by 'pointy' - the shape at the tip is definitely more concentrated at one point:

PL vs S

PL vs S

Which I happen to think looks awesome!

Another thing that worried people was the seams - those wide, black lines on top of the red sure can make them look quite threatening  but upon closer inspection, they really are just thin black lace - much like the type we so often see at the edge of cups:

Seams are less visible than the edge of the gaping cup

Now, I started off this review by saying me an EM-bras don't mix well - have I just proven myself wrong? Well, no. As you can see on some of these pictures, it gapes, especially when I move my arms forward.

Should I go down a cup-size, then? Well, maybe. The next issue is that first up, the gore isn't flat - and when I push it flat, the cups don't gape. So technically the volume is pretty good.

And then there's the annoying fact that I do get orange-in-glass-effect, which tends to ruin the stability of the bra:

Slight wrinkling at the bottom of the right seam - sorry, the flash kind of overexposes it.
Here you can also see the amazing centering shape, though!

For now, these issues can be sort of solved by popping in a pad (2 on the smaller boob), so it is definitely not something that keeps me from wearing, and loving, this bra:

with pads

With pads

Over at Bratabase, I've gotten some suggestions on how to better fix these issues, and particularly the idea of boned pads and moving the strap (to close gaping + maybe stretching out the orange-on-glass fold?), and I am very interested in trying out these alterations.