Wednesday 19 February 2014

A Tale of Two Babydolls: Curvy Kate "Lola" and "Ritzy" Review

Last week I posted about my tendency to wear wired bras to bed. With the recent WONDERFUL explosion of babydolls on the full bust market, it was a natural and fun transition to begin wearing these to bed. The babydoll phenomenon really did happen all at once, and suddenly I went from having zero options to having four. Curvy Kate put out two babydolls, the Lola:



and the Ritzy:


Cleo also produced a babydoll version of their Marcie bra:


  

Because they inexplicably decided to make this babydoll totally open in the butt, it's fairly useless for my purposes (to use as a nightgown) and therefore I'll be skipping it permanently.

The fourth option is Parfait's Alexis babydoll, which I have not yet tried:


Curvy Kate's Lola was the first to make it to my home. The structure of the cups is a padded version of their normal balconette shape, which makes it the same as the Daily Boost. Now, I knew I was taking a bit of a risk here. Curvy Kate's balconettes tend to fit me well but not give me a great shape. However, since the shape usually looks decent at first and slowly degrades throughout the day, I thought I would be totally fine with a nightwear item, which just needs to look half-decent on its own--no issues with the look under clothing. However, I thought wrong:


WAUGH! UGH! CURVY KATE WHY!!!!


The cups on this bra are So. Pointy. when combined with my full-on-top shape. Now, I am sure some readers take no issue with getting this look in a bra, but I also know that I am NOT okay with it and that many of my readers join me in attempting to avoid this shape. I encourage these readers to refer to my post "Why Do Full-On-Top Boobs Look Pointy in Full-Cup Bras?" to answer the pressing question "WHY IS THIS HAPPENING??" This Lola has balconette cups, not a full-cup structure. Even so, the graphics in that post will help to explain why this bra looks like crazy sauce on me, but will likely look totally normal on ladies with less upper fullness than me. If not exactly rounded, these cups will at least probably be 'good pointy', the cute retro look, on those who don't share my shape. Anyone who has boobs as full-on-top as mine knows that the sun will rise in the west and set in the east before our boobs can ever get that shape.........


In any case, my natural first thought was to perform the alteration described in my post "How To Make a Pointy Bra Round." To my consternation, the alteration DID NOT HELP. These cups remained stubbornly just as pointy as ever. Shortening/lengthening the straps also made no difference.



This was a tragic turn of events because the Lola babydoll is so perfect in every other way. The body is made of a soft, high-quality mesh and the hem is finished with a gorgeous wide stretch satin trim. Because it came so close to being wonderful (and yet so, so far) I decided to keep it, wear it to bed, and just avoid ever standing in direct profile in the vicinity of my boyfriend or a mirror.

For sizing reference, I got the Lola babydoll in a 32H. The cups and band run the same as other Curvy Kate balconettes. My hip measurement is about 2 inches smaller than my bust measurement, and I found that with the notch in the babydoll section where the band meets, I am able to step into it and pull it up over my hips with no difficulty. Judging from other reviews, if your hip measurement is larger than your bust, you will need to shimmy it on over your head.

Following my disappointment with the Lola babydoll, I decided to have another try with the Ritzy babydoll. This cup structure, being a half-cup, is innately much more full-on-top friendly, so I had no worries that it would work perfectly for me in the same size I'd tried in the Lola (32H). Behold:



The Ritzy is a regular old half-cup style with two vertical seams. I originally thought that Curvy Kate had experimented with a single-verticle-seam half-cup structure similar to Tutti Rouge's Betty, because you can only see one vertical seam on the cup overlay. However, the inside of the cup reveals there are two seams. This means the cup shape is the same as Curvy Kate's Tease Me and Thrill Me styles. The one difference is that the Ritzy runs larger in the cups than the later iterations of Tease Me and Thrill Me (which got smaller as the seasons went along). I only *just* squeeze into the Thrill Me in a 32H, but I get slight gapping in the Ritzy in 32H when lying down. Ladies with less upper fullness can possibly fit into a size smaller in the Ritzy than they would need in the Thrill Me and Tease Me. The band is also tighter on the Ritzy babydoll. I know some people felt that the Showgirl bands were a little too loose, so this will be good news for them.


The body section of the Ritzy babydoll was at first less to my taste than the Lola's body section. The body section is more clingy, almost as though it was static-y. It also lacks the satin trim of the Lola and is much less substantial-feeling. I prefer the Lola's body section, but I feel that Curvy Kate may have made the Ritzy's body section in this way to deal with the worries some women have about having their body swamped in a babydoll. It's a fairly classic full-bust dilemma to wish you could cut apart the sections of various items to create one that is perfect. Failing that, the Ritzy is the stronger  option for now. And it will be coming out in red for Autumn/Winter '14:


Of course, I still prefer the Lola colorway for AW14:


However, since the number of babydolls available has increased vastly from the previous zero, I'm not going to grumble too much.

12 comments:

  1. Is the red for once not sheer? Please, please oh please! I'm way too tall, so these wind up more like camis on me. I am so weirded out by the sheer as such.

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    1. I believe it still is. I think it's just an odd photo.

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  2. I wouldn't even describe the lola shape as pointy, not even "bad pointy", it is just weird. Round in places, pointy in others, it's like it's fighting with your boobs (of course your boobs win!). I vastly prefered the Ritzy before seeing in worn, but I can understand what you mean about the body section. Still, the bra part just looks more sleek and modern to me, regardless of shape.

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  3. EM also came out with her babydoll at the same time. It really was surprising how many brands came out with it at once.

    Sadly, I tried both the CK options and neither worked for me.

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  4. Can you comment more on the cup fit of the Ritzy? Was the 32H a good fit for you? Were the cups wide and shallow or ok for you? I have it in a 32HH and the cups seem too shallow at the bottom. :( Makes me sad as this bra is gorgeous. I was looking for an upgrade of my 30J Tease me as I read that the Ritzy is more true to size. My tease me is about 1-2 cups too small but I love it anyway!!

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    1. The cup shape is the same as Thrill Me and Tease Me, but just runs a little bigger. Most half cups don't have much volume at the bottom, but since I am full on top it's with very little lower volume it's a good cup shape for me. The cups are fairly shallow and wide, like Thrill Me and Tease Me, which is a good thing for me (not everyone needs narrow, deep cups). As I said in the post, the Ritzy is a good fit with a tiny bit of gapping.

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  5. Can you comment more on the cup fit of the Ritzy? Was the 32H a good fit for you? Were the cups wide and shallow or ok for you? I have it in a 32HH and the cups seem too shallow at the bottom. :( Makes me sad as this bra is gorgeous. I was looking for an upgrade of my 30J Tease me as I read that the Ritzy is more true to size. My tease me is about 1-2 cups too small but I love it anyway!!

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  6. Hello hello, I just thought I'd drop in and thank you for adding me to your blogroll :) Love the website -- keep it up!

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  7. I really love the ritzy....! I'm glad it gives good shape.

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  8. If you actually wear these to bed, like for sleeping (not sexytime with the bf) your life is very different than mine. Up here in the frozen north it's waffle thermals and flannel pants.

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  9. Is it me, or have Curvy Kate bras deteriorated in the last year or so? A few years ago they were amazing, and had a great fit, but now the cups seem to give an awful shape, and the straps curl, which makes them very uncomfortable to wear. A shame as their design (print/colours) are amazing!

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  10. The NightLift Bra is not worth the penny you probably couldn't balance on it let alone which will set you back $100 USD [for the base model]. It pinches and pulls in all of the wrong places leaving you with what looks like the octoboob. Their customer service is smug, only returning partial funds due to outrageous shipping fees having been promised free shipping then paid return shipping. $138.00 -$20.00 for return -$40.00 for the surprise initial shipping.

    If you do decide to go this route note that the sizing is far larger than other US sizes I'd downsize the band by two sizes. The bra was quite difficult to fall asleep in and I honestly hoped I might even have the opportunity to treat it a little like lingerie judging by the photos on the website but I'm not sure I could take myself seriously in this archaic torture device.

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