Outfit post: Spaaaaaaace caaaaaats!

It's Unsuitable Deadline Day purchase time again! I have a list of things that would be genuinely useful for my wardrobe: a black jersey dress, chestnut brogues or loafers, plain navy top, white bra that actually fits… so what do I buy? A dress designed for someone fifteen years younger and four stone lighter than I am.

But look: space cats! It's got little astronaut cats coming out of space capsules, and other mogs in party hats celebrating.

This is a Lindy Bop dress, and I know from other bloggers that their quality has a reputation for being patchy, but I couldn't resist a dress covered in cats dressed as astronauts, and as it was just £19 in the sale I decided to give it a go.

The good
Well, duh! Space cats! This print is ace.

Lindy Bop does larger sizes. I can live with brands that only do smaller sizes – I simply don't look at their websites – but do get really wound up by brands that do plus sizes but only a handful of designs, so you go to look at their sites and see loads of lovely clothes, then have to click on the 'plus size' tab and see a mere handful of designs in larger sizes, and not the nicest ones.

The bad
The bust seam cuts across my bust. I'm a G-cup, and (I believe) the British high street cuts for around a C-cup. Compare a pint bowl with a half-pint bowl. Same shape, wider top, right? In torso terms, big boobs start lower. There's less of a gap between waist and bust. This dress was clearly cut for smaller boobs than mine. As it is, my mighty mams force the dress into the shape they want it to be, but that seam still looks odd, and I suspect this would be the case with other LB dresses. In their defence, this is not a problem unique to this firm.

Padded cups. Nothing like the shape of my actual bust – though, as with the seam issue, 'the girls' do their own thing there and force it to comply. Possibly the padding's there for people who want to wear this dress without a bra, though as someone who spent the late 90s wearing waify slip dresses, I believe if your boobs are small/firm enough to go braless you don't need padded cups, and if they're not small/firm enough to go braless, a couple of flimsy bits of foam and no actual support does sod-all good. In case you're feeling nosy, I wear a bra under my dress.

Sooo... How do I feel about the Space Cats? 
I'm on the fence on this one. As I said, I love the print. I can't send the dress back because Ziggy, who loves shredding paper, attacked the returns form. I'm tempted to take it to an alterations place in Bath and get it turned into a skirt, as it's the top half that's problematic. I got round that today by plonking a cardigan over the top. I'd order from Lindy Bop again, but I'd get a skirt, not a complete dress. Or order dresses knowing I was going to turn them into skirts.