Empowered [Love UR Look]

In the vintage inspired and reproduction scene all companies have their own niche and look, but there’s still a lot of overlap in style, understandably, because everyone is drawing from the same pot of inspiration. Love UR Look, however, is one of those  brands when I can tell the second I see one of their pieces that it is made by them. They take vintage inspired dress shapes and design features, and they make them totally their own with quirky and fun prints, some novelty, others not, but all distinctly Love UR Look. This dress we’re looking at today is a perfect representation of a design only Love UR Look could come up with; I present to you, Empower You.

Plus size pinup Miss Amy May models the Empower You Panel dress gifted by Love UR Look for a fit and size review Continue reading

Swing Coat Livin’ [Love UR Look]

I never used to be this kind of woman, but over the past year I have become her–a woman who can’t stop collecting coats. Once upon a time in my pre-pinup days I think there were probably several years together that I didn’t even own one. I even used to think it was ridiculous to need more than one or two coats. Why would someone need more than a light coat and a heavy winter coat? I thought.

Style, that’s why. Sometimes you need a cropped fitted jacket, whether tweed or faux leather. Sometimes the occasion calls for nothing more than a chic cape. Sometimes you need a hooded, waterproof option, and at other times a classic lightweight trench. And then, as a pinup, sometimes–often, depending on your location–you will definitely need a warm, full-skirted, bepocketed, truly fabulous winter option. Today, Love UR Look is presenting us with just that.

Love UR Look black belt swing coat ethically made woman owned plus size pinup Miss Amy May

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Full of Roses [Love UR Look]

If you’ve been following my blog for a long time you’ll be familiar with Love Ur Look. Like many other companies, I’ve featured them here almost every season since this blog began, but I’m sure if you looked back through my past reviews you’d recognise the pieces I shared instantaneously; because if there’s one thing Love UR Look knows how to do, it’s produce dresses that don’t look like anyone else’s.

Their dresses are always unique, often made in original hand-drawn fabrics or re-imagined vintage prints, and almost always featuring little design details I just don’t see anywhere else. Necklines that are shaped by atomic-inspired zig zag cut outs, bodices that feature layered fabric folds that give the word ‘structure’ a new meaning, contrasting panels layered over novelty fabrics with brightly coloured buttons. Whenever I see a Love UR Look dress, I can always tell the brand without needing to check a caption or a label or a website. Today, we’re looking at one of their more gentle, less novelty designs, in a flower print that shares my mother’s name: today we gaze at roses.

Miss Amy May Love UR Look 1950s Rose Belt Front dress

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Apple of My Eye [Love UR Look]

I know I’m an adult (technically, by age, perhaps not so much by personality)–but I hold a grudge against apples. They make me sort of grumpy, likely to pull a stubbornly ill-accommodating face like a 6 year old offered spinach. I am known to describe powdery apples as ‘tasting of disappointment and hell.’

It’s because during phases of my life when I was determined to be several dress sizes smaller than it is naturally comfortable for me to be, I ate so many apples that I am now permanently sick of them…in their natural form. In an apple pie or a crumble, however? Apples and I are very definitely friends again then. In a strudel, for sure, load me up. Apple danish, fritters, muffins–basically any way in which you can take an apple and improve upon it by caking it in sweetened crusts, batter and actual cake, I am entirely on board. But off a tree? No thank you, only to pose with for adorable late summer photos.

Well, as it happens I’ve found another way I don’t mind apples: wearing them. Namely, in the form of the Love UR Look Green Apple Shirt dress. It’s cute, it’s quirky, and it has the added benefit of not potentially widening my waistline like my other preferred servings of apples are likely to do.

Love UR Look Green Apple shirt dress Continue reading

Mexicana Magic [Love UR Look]

Earlier in the year I attended London Edge to preview the SS16 releases from many different vintage inspired brands. Having featured Love Ur Look here on the blog last summer, I was eager to drop by their booth to see their new offerings for this season and to meet their owner and designer Ronke in person, who was even more lovely and charming than I had anticipated. As we chatted on and on about our favourite aspects of vintage styles, my eyes couldn’t help but roam the racks of new pretties on display around us. The Mexicana dress was an immediate stand-out for me and I couldn’t help but fawn a little over the print.

I took home a little postcard showing off some of their upcoming pieces, the Mexicana dress pictured front and centre, and pinned it to the magnetic chalk board I keep beside my computer, my blogging and reminders board, just in case there was any chance I could forget that dress. There wasn’t. I couldn’t wait for it to come out. And now, finally, the time has come. Let’s see if you’re as obsessed with it as I am.

Love UR Look Mexicana dress Continue reading

Love UR Look Picnic Dress + Giveaway

Love Ur Look is a UK designed clothing company that produces feminine and flattering vintage style clothing that is all ethically produced. Their dresses cost around £50, their skirts £30 and their tops around £20, which are great prices for repro clothing but especially when you consider that every item is made ethically without cutting corners. Many modern clothing companies outsource to foreign factories willing to overlook minimum age and wage laws, but Love Ur Look consciously chose to seek out ethical production sources both in the UK and India right from their very first collection, ensuring that all workers involved in their production are treated humanely, freely chose their employment and comply with minimum wage laws and minimum age restrictions, amongst other requirements. This ethical background is something I had already heard about Love UR Look, so when designer and owner Ronke recently contacted me asking if I’d like to check out a piece from their new spring/summer line, I jumped at the chance.

loveurarrive You can tell a lot about a company from the way your items arrive, with smaller companies often going the extra length to package their products prettily and with great care. My Love UR Look dress arrived lovingly packed in a printed lavender scented dust bag, something I thought was a sweet touch. The dress they sent me is a floral check dress that they have since named the Floral Picnic dress in honour of The Picnic In The Park event I am helping to host this weekend in London as part of The British Belles.
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