Clothing Review: Made In Preston Aztec Bralet

Basically as soon as Made In Preston started to release their promo photos, I got very excited for their lines. I love a lot of pieces from the other full bust brands (Urkye, BiuBiu, Pepperberry, etc.), but I’m only 20 years old and it often feels like those retailers are aimed at a slightly older customer, with longer skirts and button down shirts and solid colors. Everyone needs basics, and I love the clothes I have from there, but it made me sad to see the fashionable colors and prints and shapes that the girls who fit into straight sizes around me were wearing that I knew I could never fit into. Enter Made In Preston!

So, when By Baby’s Rules offered to give me the Aztec Bralet that didn’t work quite right on her, I jumped at the chance! And, spoiler alert, I love it! (Make sure to read her brand overview for Made In Preston as well!)

By Baby’s Rules received this in an 8 Fab, and I’m usually a size 10, so it’s not a perfect fit, but there’s no way I’m giving it up! It’s just a little small around my stomach, so although I love crop tops, I won’t be showing my belly in this one. I found plenty of other ways to wear it!

Fit wise, this top would be perfect on someone who was a usual size 8 UK (so a size 4 US). The waist would fit best on someone who was 26″-27″, I’d guess, and I’m usually around 28″. The cups on this are pretty generous though! I’d say that right now I’m in the 30HH/J-28J/JJ range (as opposed to my previous 28JJ/K), and although this fits me well, I think someone who was a 28K could still wear this comfortably, assuming they were alright with showing off a little boob. The best part about the cups are the wires! I was so nervous that the wires would be in line width wise with other UK brands, which are far too wide for me, but they actually are quite narrow, and fit similarly to the wires on my Ewa Michalak PL Mak. This makes me have a LOT of hope for Made In Preston’s future lingerie line! Hopefully my boobs will keep shrinking so that I can fit into that line when it comes out, because it seems like they are going to have wires that fit me well! I think that if I were purchasing another bralet top for myself (which I will be if I get the funds), my ideal size would be a 10 Foxy, or maybe a 12 Foxy (since when things show my stomach I like to purchase them on the larger side).

The only issues I have with this top are issues that I have with almost every bra, due to being high set and close set. The gore is too wide for me, but it still tacks alright in the middle, and doesn’t cause any real issues. The straps are predictably slightly too long for me! In the pictures I have the triangular part that connects to the single strap pinned short, because although it really adds to the look of the top, it made the straps too long for me. Here’s what the straps look like on me when they’re not pinned:

Even when they aren’t pinned, one half of the triangle sits mostly under my arm and isn’t visible from the front, though I’m not sure why. Since this wasn’t something I bought for myself (and therefore not the perfect size), I’m going to assume that this is a product of a slightly too small top.

This top makes a great going out top, but it also could be dressed down. I’ll be wearing it in the fall and winter with stretchy black pants and a sweater, like this, for a dressed down look:

 

While brainstorming outfit ideas for this top, I began to wonder if the longline band meant that it would be supportive enough to wear strapless…

Success!! By tucking the straps in and padding out the cups a little bit with my Ewa Michalak push up pads, I can wear this as a strapless top! I never would’ve imagined that I could wear something like this, but it actually does a great job keeping my boobs up and where they should be, even without the straps. This just goes to show that the rest of the full bust retailers (both lingerie and clothing) are really missing out by not making longline bras and tops in the larger sizes! We really benefit from that extra support, and it makes things like this possible!

This item was vaguely gifted to me (since it was gifted to By Baby’s Rules, who then gifted it to me), but all these thoughts are my own! This top really has blown my mind, and when I get the money I will be seeking out the Africa Bralet as well, which I imagine would be the better choice for ladies who always struggle with too long straps, since it is a halter neck. And when I just went to the website to grab the link for that top, I saw that they have also added this super gorgeous Hot Pink Bralet! I’m seriously obsessed with these tops, and if they keep adding more then I am going to go broke from buying them.

 

 

Do You Have High Set Breasts?

Hi guys!! I know it’s been forever and a day since I last had a real post, but here I am, and hopefully things will get a bit more regular now that I’m getting on a more regular school/sleep/work schedule!

I know I’ve referred to my breasts as being high set before, and so have a lot of other bloggers, but I don’t think anyone’s ever actually described why they think of their breasts as high set. So this post is just about why I think of my breasts as being high set on my chest, and what problems result from that.

Okay, so that really poorly done paint drawing above is my attempt at drawing what my boobs look like braless (even though their shape is pretty different than the drawing, the placement is pretty accurate). As you can see, my naked breast’s apex is already at/slightly above  where bra fitters say your apex should sit while in a properly fitted bra (generally agreed upon as halfway between your shoulder and elbow). The bottom of my root sits even higher, my root ends only about 3″ below my armpits.

So, as you may imagine, this leads to a lot of bra fit issues. Mostly commonly, I deal with having to tighten my straps a lot to get anything resembling lift. Because my boobs are so high set, most bras just sort of shape them into a not-pointy-or-un-bra-ed-looking shape, but don’t lift them higher than they actually sit naturally. I also have to tighten the straps a lot to even just get the wires to sit under my root at all. Having to wear my straps tightly means that if something says “half adjustable” I will most likely just not buy it. No point really, it almost definitely will not give me any lift at all.

Also, this means that I have to be careful about wires and wings that are even the slightest bit tall. Really, I need the shortest wires available. The only brands I’ve found that has wires short enough for me to be comfortable in them are Comexim and Kris Line. Ewa Michalak’s wires were comfortable in smaller sizes, but in larger sizes they got too tall (and they would argue that that’s because my cup is too big, but in the smaller sizes I quadboob if I tighten the straps enough to get any lift, so… yeah, there will probably be a post about that in the near future 😀 It’s a whole ‘nother topic). A lot of women loooooove a wider band, because it tends to be more comfortable, but for me a wider band means armpit chafing hell

This also means that cups are almost always too tall on me, or higher coverage than you’d expect. Since my root starts so high, the underwires have to sit that high, and the rest of the bra covers the corresponding area. This is the most annoying part for me, since, as I’ve said many times on this blog, my ideal bra is lowest coverage possible. I’m looking into Comexim for my next bra purchase (who knows when that’ll be though, I’m super poor), and when I do eventually order from them again, I will be getting lowered cups and lowered gore! I’m pretty excited about that.

So, if you often experience these problems (full coverage cups, having to super-tighten your straps to get any lift, wires always poking your armpits), then you might have high set breasts! These things can all also be symptoms of trying to compensate for too-big cups though, so do what I did: try wearing your bra around with the straps loosened as much as possible for a day (just pad out any extra space in the bra) and see how it goes! Even better would be to use a bra that is usually too small if you tighten the straps to your usual level, so that you don’t need to pad anything out.

 

 

Size Variance At Victoria’s Secret

Size Variance at Victoria’s Secret

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PN-LVey97H8

My Bra Confessions

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLFQQY_-y8M

I know most of y’all have seen these videos before, but I’m changing things around on my YouTube channel to try to attract fewer creepers (seriously so many gross people there), so I’m making my videos unlisted. This means they can only be viewed with a link, which is why I’m being redundant by posting old videos here! So there’s nothing new here if you’ve watched these videos before 🙂

Sorry guys…

Hello everyone, I’m still alive!!

Just wanted to apologize about my lengthy absence – I recently got a job, was taking a summer class, AND my best friend moved across the country (so I was spending as much time with him as possible) and as a result, blogging fell to the wayside. 

On top of all that busy-ness, there’s the added issue of my ever changing bra size. My boobs seem to have shrunk some, and my band size seems to have grow (? all while losing weight? I don’t know, it’s confusing), so it’s been hard for me to talk candidly about bras and boobs and bra issues when I don’t even know what my issues are anymore!! (Extra apologies to the ladies at Balkonetka who I abandoned in the midst of receiving excellent advice for this reason!)

I do have a few posts on the horizon though, now that my friend has moved away and my class has ended. So hopefully you’ll be seeing new content up before this Friday!