I've wanted to try out Made By Niki for years but their sizing has always put me off. With the smallest size available always being billed as a UK 8, i was pretty certain it wouldn't fit me since i straddle the line between a UK 4 and a UK 6. A while back i was offered the chance to borrow some samples for a review or photoshoot but i'm a firm believer that bloggers should either spend their own money to support brands OR the post should be treated as a mutual collaboration where the blogger is compensated for their time, effort and for the readership they've spent time growing. I completely get why Made By Niki as an independent brand don't invest in bloggers as promotion, and i'm firmly against this new mindset that every damn blogger, instagrammer, social media user has in which they believe they are entitled to free stuff from everyone. So i chose to wait until i had the funds and desire to take a chance on their pieces (which was helped by their very generous returns policy) and that way i could both share with you guys my thoughts on the fit (in particular for very small busts like mine) but also have something lasting and tangible to keep afterwards.
Unfortunately i have a long list of indie brands that i want to buy from and review and so with my interest mostly lying in owning one of the string pieces and their assumed impracticality, Made By Niki accidentally slipped to the bottom of the pile. But my bank account was greased, and my hand forced, by a ridiculously generous "Black Friday" sale. I would love to be able to support every indie brand at full price but money is very tight at the moment and even more so, my entire disposable income has gone into gifts and transport for the holidays. So even at their highly discounted price, this was still a total naughty splurge that i should not have indulged in. But i did and of course i don't regret it.
Even though the sale must have been a very busy time for them, my package was dispatched quickly, with multiple emails updating me on my order status and providing a tracking number for when it shipped. It arrived in a discreet, black package (which really suited my aesthetic tastes and i kind of wish i could send all my post that way) and the lingerie was wrapped in individual plastic bags inside a nicely designed box. I'm the biggest encourager of box packaging as i continue to use them as storage. I have shelves upon shelves of white and black boxes and an overflowing trunk of pink. To me it's neater and more efficient to store my luxury pieces separately, and not have them all thrown in a draw. But i digress, tl;dr: it arrived quickly and wonderfully packaged.
So i indulged in the AW15 "Love Your Body" collection and picked up the "Sheer & Shaping panties" and the "Tingling String Fringe bra". Both were bought in a UK 8. Unfortunately (i imagine due to the sale) these styles are now sold out but the knickers are available in black and the same style of bra is available in yellow (from the SS13 collection).
This string bra fastens with an engraved clasp at the central gore and the straps can be worn like a regular bra or a racer back due to the presence of a small hook and o-ring fastening. The cups are lined with a beige mesh and free hanging strings in a very pale lilac and pink lie on top. The band is fully adjustable with a slider, at it's tightest it measures 22" and stretches to 26" and at it's loosest it measures 28.5" and stretches to 35". The shoulder straps also have two points of adjustability, one slider above the racer back fastening and one below.
This bra fits perfectly, it is snug around the band (when the slider is adjusted to half way for me) and snug around the shoulder straps (i like to wear it as a racer back for that extra support). I find this gives me a flattened shape in that i get a small bit of cleavage but there's no lift. The only slight downside is that the edge of the cups sit quite high up on my chest, so i get a little roll of armpit fat when i have my arms down. I'm sure if you had a larger bust it might stop this part of the cups from sitting flush and therefore reduce the armpit roll.
There are two types of String bra, one is completely open cup and the smallest size is billed as a 32A-C. I personally prefer the style i bought as the strings sit flat and i feel this is a more flattering silhouette than hanging strings that tend to make the bust look slightly pointed. For small busts i would hazard a guess that the other style wouldn't sit particularly great and i personally don't feel it would flatter my bust. I also consider the wide range of fit of this string piece to be a reflection of the numerous adjustable straps. With a regular bra style band with hook and eye closures, there just won't be that level of adjustability, not to mention a 32 band is already too large for most small busts.
Unfortunately in this collection, the matching piece to the string bra was a string skirt (like this one but in pink) and there was no string brief. So out of that weird compulsion that lives inside all lingerie collectors and makes us want to buy two similar pieces together, i went for the knickers from the same collection but a different range. The pink used for these knickers doesn't match the pink on the string bra, but the nature of the lilac and pink stripes drawing your eyes to average the colour, kind of makes it look like they match. So i am happy to wear them together although it would have been nice for the same shades to be used within the range, or for a brief option to be made to match each bra.
These knickers are billed as "shapewear" however i don't find these have any shaping effect on me, certainly no more so than any high waisted briefs. They are constructed from a thick, elastic waistband with panels of sheer pink mesh and a central diamond panel of floral pink mesh that extends under the gusset and peeks out in a flattering manner on the bottom of the arse. I assume for ease of getting them on as the waistband doesn't stretch a great deal, there's a long zip in the back with ribbons attached and a hook and eye closure at the top. There are four little pink bows, two at the front and two at the back, that hide the holes that the optional garter straps attach to with large hooks.
The fit isn't perfect for me, which may be why i don't feel like these act as shapewear, and they are a little large in places so the fabric buckles. The waist on these measures 24" without stretching, which is the approximate measurement of my waist, and so i'd probably need a size down to get the full effect. However these do fit my sizeable arse quite nicely so in true small waist/big butt style, there probably isn't a happy medium and i'd rather have a little room at the waist and hips than have the blood supply cut to the bottom half of my butt.
Maybe i've been internalising the wardrobe dept of Scream Queens a little too much, or maybe i'm going soft in my old age and i'm less picky about my candy stripes (they're not all created equal y'know) but the fact that a shade of lilac has made it into my presence and not made me feel physically ill is a big win for me and for the design team at Made By Niki. I love this "set" and i have no shame in parading around like some pink-obsessed siren because let's face it, i am slowly turning into one. Made By Niki still have a lot of hefty reductions on their pieces and i'm sincerely hoping it's just them preparing for SS16 but if you've ever wanted to own one of their styles and maybe didn't have the funds or the knowledge of the fit, now is the time to invest. And you have my blessing to do so.