Oh Gwyneth....

I'm the absolute tool who has been spreading these images around my social media before I even bothered to write the post. The problem is, when I try a dress on and I *feel fantastic* I go to take blog photos, then I love the photos so much I just have to Instagram, Facebook and Tumblr them all before I've even had the chance of writing a blog post. I can imagine I am very annoying to anyone who follows me on any of those formats; particularly Instagram to which I am a self-confessed addict.

So I first wore this to the Pinup Picnic In The Park event back in June but I have not worn it since. It was a second-hand buy from a lady on Facebook and I feel I really lucked out with this one. Now, I'm an owner of other Voodoo Vixen dresses, but I was glad to get this one second-hand as I didn't know how their wiggle dresses would fit me. I mean, I was rather happy when I came across this on Facebook because I couldn't afford it at full price, not knowing what the fit would be like (and yeah, VV dresses are really reasonable) so I thought I'd rather take this opportunity to try the dress at a slightly cheaper price but pre-owned. 

Thankfully, and to my utter delight, the dress arrived in pretty much perfect condition. To me, it looked brand new. Fit wise, it isn't perfect on me but these days, I tend to size up on wiggle dresses; I'm a little self concious of my belly and my weight is constantly fluctuating so I'm scared of wearing my ACTUAL SIZE. Silly, I know. However, I needn't have worried here as it's clear that this dress isn't skin tight and didn't leave me feeling vulnerable. In fact, I would have quite happily have sized down and not feel like all my lumpy bits - which I am constantly trying to love - were on show. I believe the dress is still wearable despite the considerable amount of room on my shoulders (at some points during the picnic, the shoulders kept falling down but I found it rather amusing). 

So the dress does come with it's own belt but personally, I found it wasn't sturdy enough for me so that I could cinch in my waist. In these photos, I'm wearing my What Katie Did - Morticia corset so obviously my waist looks tinier than normal and with ALL this extra room, I turned to my trusty white waist belt from eBay to tie the look together. This isn't a thing with just this particular dress because any dress that I buy that comes with a belt, I usually replace it with another..I'm a bit fussy like that you see. 

I need to talk about how gorgeous the print is though; the nautical theme suits me through and through as you may or may not have seen my anchor tattoo on my forearm. I'm a bit fan of this theme so it's fabulous when I get to incorporate it into my wardrobe. I feel the navy and white colours of this dress make it a really simple yet classy outfit to wear as it doesn't really make a statement as such but can easily be dressed up as it can be dressed down. Also, can we PLEASE notice the POCKETS?! Yes, a dress that has pockets is the Holy Grail.

Made of 97% cotton with 3% elastane, there is a touch of stretch so it is very forgiving on the body, as I mentioned before. The one part of it I do really love is how thick the dress feels; it really doesn't feel flimsy or cheap. Yet I was let down in the buttons department; within a few hours of my second wear, the buttons down the front started withering away and falling off. This isn't the first time this has happened to me with a dress. It happened on my other Voodoo Vixen 'Tilly' dress, a Lindy Bop dress and now this. I'm starting to become wary of buying dresses with sown on buttons because they just fall off so quickly. I mean, it's alright when you have the spare button which comes with most dresses...but when more than one falls off and it's in public and you can't retrieve it, you start looking silly. For me, this aspect ruined (a teeny tiny bit, I will find other buttons to sow on, I refuse to let this get me down) the dress slightly, but not much. 

I'm so impressed with the way this dress makes my body look (even without the corset on underneath) as it gives it a silhouette and perfectly outlines my figure. Moreover, the dress is just rather pleasing to the eye and I'm totally in love with the cut of it. The kick pleat at the back does help, along with the slight stretch in the dress, to walk around and sit down in (like when you're sitting around at picnics!)

Now I know their pencil dresses fit me well enough, I have my eye on the 'Allison' dress, you can see here. This one is going straight to my wishlist and I will be purchasing brand new, because who doesn't love a new parcel in the post anyway?! 

Shoes by B.A.I.T Footwear. 

Until next time my lovelies, thank you for reading <3
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xo