“Mad Men” by Banana Republic
Deliciously chic with a modern take on the cool polish and panache of the 1960s era, Banana Republic’s “Mad Men” inspired collection of classy, dress-up American sportswear is just what we’ve all been craving… that, and the next season of the AMC hit series, but we’ll have to wait until early 2012 for that.
Inspired by the effortlessly elegant retro fashions of the Emmy and Golden Globe Award-winning series, the “Mad Men” series-inspired collection is a designed by Banana Republic in collaboration with the show’s Emmy Award-winning Costume Designer Janie Bryant, a union which has resulted in nearly 65 garments and accessories for women and men, embodying the style tenets of the era.
“Working with Janie to gain a true understanding of the ‘Mad Men’ look and feel was a delight,” says Banana Republic Creative Director Simon Kneen. “Janie was instrumental in helping us achieve the series aesthetic and standard of authenticity with this capsule collection, offering sketches, her own inspirations and actual artifacts from the production set to help inspire the ‘Mad Men’ within all of us.”
For we Mad Women, the women’s pieces are clean and modern whilst lady-like, including the stylish utility of trench coats, tailored dresses to flatter every figure. Sexy secretary staples like high-waisted skirts, silk tie-neck blouses,and statement accessories including print scarves and leopard print pump heels add an extra punch to the mostly neutral collection which hovers in beautiful fabrics in shades of gray and black with the occasional welcome splash of blue, plum, gold, magenta, orange and rouge.
This impressive “grown-up” collection has been crafted through the Banana Republic lens of affordable fashion and noticeable quality; women’s apparel and accessory pieces priced between $40 and $250.
“Collaborating with Simon and his team to design this collection was an experience I’ll never forget,” says legendary Costume Designer Janie Bryant. “It’s so rewarding to help create a collection that will allow fans of the series to channel their own ‘Mad Men’ style and take home fashionable items that are modern, not costume.”
DVF Wrap Dresses
Season after season, the flawless wrap dress finds itself reworked, redesigned and reinvented on the runways of modern designers, but one woman alone can take the credit for the fabulous little package that is the wrap dress.
Designing the Wrap Dress
Introduced to fashionable women by the legendary powerhouse of style, Diane von Furstenberg in the 1970s, more than three decades later the wrap dress continues to be as flattering and curve-loving as ever.
In 1972, Belgian born designer Diane von Furstenberg’s concept for the contemporary wrap dress began as a cotton jersey shirt dress similar to the pattern for a wrapped dancer’s sweater. And just a few years later, in 1974, the shirt prototype was elongated into the fabulous frock commonly known as the wrap dress.
Von Furstenberg’s revolutionary design earned her massive acclaimBy 1976 Diane von Furstenberg had sold over a million of her signature wrap dresses and landed on the cover of The Wall Street Journal and Newsweek, the latter dubbing her “the most marketable woman since Coco Chanel. Today, Diane von Furstenberg is the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) president. and came to symbolize female power and freedom to an entire generation as she encouraged women to “feel like a woman, wear a dress.”
Inspired by a chic, young generation of women who were buying vintage 1970s wrap dresses, Diane re-launched her wrap dress collection in 1997.
Of course, wrap-style dresses have been around for centuries, such as the kimono and toga, but the modern wrap dress has streamlined, simple lines that every woman can appreciate. And the queen of color and print does not disappoint in her effortlessly chic New Jeanne Wrap Dress and the ¾ length sleeve New Julian Wrap Dress; available in a multitude of vibrant colors and tasteful geometric and tribal prints and patterns, these iconic wrap dresses are at once classic and modern.
The Figure-Flattering Wrap Dress
If ever there was a garment designed to flatter a woman’s figure, it was to be the wrap dress. Tall and willowy, shorter and shapely, plus sized or petite, the wrap dress looks phenomenal on every shape. The folding style of the wrap dress hugs a woman’s body in all the right places, skimming the hips, accentuating cleavage, and cinching the waist.
Curvy Body Type
If you are curvy with an hour-glass figure, the cross-over wrap dress with its lovely waist-cinching tie further accentuates a narrow waist, full bosom, and shapely hips.
Straight Body Type
If you have more of a rectangular or straight figure, with little difference between your hips and waist – like Diane von Furstenberg herself – the wrap dress will create the illusion of a more womanly shape thanks to its waist-cinching closure. And women with flatter chests can indulge in deeper necklines without worrying about looking too risqué.
Maternity Wrap Dresses
Since the wrap dress is extremely customizable, the wrap dress is also an excellent investment for the expectant mother. A jersey-knit maternity wrap dress, will take you from early first trimester (before you’ve shared the news) and well into the second or third trimester. The tie will sit just below your bust line once your waist disappears, and the fluid stretch fabric will flatter your rounded, pregnant body.
The Versatile Wrap Dress: Dressy or Casual
A true chameleon, the wrap dress is one of the only garments that can be dressed up for a formal evening affair with sexy stilettos and stunning earrings, converted to a casual weekend brunch look with boots, chunky jewelry and a pashmina, dressed way down at the beach worn over your swimsuit with flip flops, or made totally funky and modern worn over leggings or your favorite jeans.
A testament to its universally flattering shape and versatility, the wrap around dress can be found in nearly every fabric, style and color.
Bras for Full-Figure Breasts
Conturelle Mystere Lace Bra
Breasts. Like women, they come in all shapes and sizes. So you’d think that bras of all sizes, shapes and styles would be readily available to meet women’s needs, right? Not so; like a lot of things in the world of fashion, there are seem to be fewer options available to the entire diversity of real women’s body shapes and sizes.
Bra & Lingerie Options for Women with Large Breasts
Most bra and lingerie boutiques to cater to women who wear a size D or smaller, which leaves a significant proportion of women feeling (literally) unsupported, and with little choice in the way of well-fitting, attractive lingerie.
It’s quite ironic that the group of women who most need the support of a well-fitting bra have the fewest options when it comes to size and style, no?
Enter Claire Dumican. Claire knows breasts. After moving to Canada, only to discover a sorry lack of lingerie options for women with large breasts, this British-born, big busted, blonde, former technology communications specialist made it her mission to help full-busted women everywhere get into the right size bra and feel fabulous about themselves.
What is “Full Bust?”
Claire explains that there are three distinct groups in media for women to identify with:
- Skinny models (who resonate with very few real women)
- Plus size (who have a band size 40 inches and greater)
- Mainstream, women who wear dress size 4 to 10 with a band size between 28 to 38 inches, and up to a size D cup
Full-busted women have traditionally been left out in the cold, so to speak: “What if you’re a dress size 6 and you have ad 32 H bust – who and where do you look to for your body type?” asks Claire, “It’s all them and real and they want to be able to dress properly and it’s not available.”
What about fake boobs? Fake boobs don’t need as much support as real boobs, she explains, which are very heavy and bounce a lot.
The Butterfly Collection: Bras for Big Boobs in Canada & Around the World
In 2010, Claire’s passion for getting big boobs into beautiful bras led her to launch the Butterfly Collection, Canada’s first DD-KK cup online bra boutique. And following a perusal of her website and a thoroughly enjoyable Skype conversation, it was evident that Claire is truly living her passion and is excited to communicate her immense wealth of knowledge about breasts and bras.
In addition being an online retail source of superior quality, supportive, pretty and sexy bras and lingerie for large-breasted and plus size women, the Butterfly Collection website also serves as an important educational resource.
While the Butterfly Collection’s retail section caters exclusively to women above a D cup, a lot of the information on the site is of value to women of any bra-size, offering essential tools to help women learn to measure their own bra size accurately and determine which style of bra is most appropriate with different outfits or activities, as well as informing women about the importance of breast health and the role that wearing a supportive, beautiful bra plays in back health, and overall physical and emotional well-being.
Glamour Curves Plunge Bra
Challenges Faced by Full-Busted or Plus Size Women in Finding the Right Bra
One obstacle large-breasted ladies typically face is the embarrassment factor; consider that most brick-and-mortar boutiques don’t even carry cup sizes above a size D, combine that with employees who may not be particularly adept at fitting bras, and you’re often left with large-breasted women being told that their boobs are too massive.
“It’s crushing to hear that your breasts are too big,” Claire says. “They buy off-the-rack bras that their boobs don’t fit into, and it’s a killer of self esteem.”
Smashing Your Boobs into Bras That Don’t Fit (The Smaller Cup / Bigger Band Trick)
One tactic stores may use to get a woman to “fit” into a bra is to try to squeeze large breasts into a smaller cup size by going up in the band size. Claire warns, “A bra should fit you, not the other way around.”
Unlike women with smaller bosoms, full busted women have a significant amount of breast tissue under the armpits, so it is critical for women with large breasts that all of their breast tissue fit into the cup.
As Claire so poignantly put it, “The more boob you have, the wider it spreads.”
Get Those Boobs Up & Out
The smaller-cup and larger band mash-up may lead to issues of discomfort, and will also lead to a less flattering look since the breast tissue will spread out to the side instead of being pushed up into a nice perky rack out front. Lift those ta-ta’s to reveal your waist and amp up the va-va-voom factor of your curvy figure.
So, You Think You Know Your Bra Size?
The truth is, most women are in the wrong bra size. Some of the Butterfly Collection’s customers have never previously been fitted or actually measured themselves for their bra size (yes, you can do this all by yourself!), while others haven’t had a fitting in 12 to 15 years. For some reason, we’re brought up to believe that our boobs aren’t our own; we’re afraid to measure our own boobs and think that we need someone else to tell us what size we are, when in reality, it couldn’t be simpler.
Nonetheless, for many women the idea of measuring and fitting a bra is daunting, so Claire makes herself available to talk women through the fitting process with the Butterfly Collection over the phone.
“This is your body and you can reclaim it. You don’t need to be told by somebody else what you are or aren’t.”
Claire believes women need to take responsibility for their bodies and breasts. Measure yourself before you go bra shopping to make sure that you get a proper fitting, “It is about owning your boobs; they’re not there to annoy you, they’re there to make you look fabulous!”
Grenier Easyfit Bra
Keep Your Big Boobs in the Right Size Bra
Breast size changes throughout a woman’s life; you should re-measure your bra size regularly:
- Once a year on average
- Every two months if you’re dieting or losing weight
- During and after pregnancy and nursing
- After any time of great stress (divorce, bereavement, etc.)
Besides getting to go shopping for a fun and flirty new bra, when you’re in the right bra size, you get your waist back; and the further your boobs are from your knees, the better you feel.
What a Difference a Bra Makes
To put Claire’s advice, measuring guide, and beautiful bras to the test, we had one of our own full-busted ladies (my mom) try out Claire’s tips and one of her most popular bras, the Grenier Easyfit Bra.
I was astonished to learn that my mother had been squeezing her ample bosom into 38C bras; she had always shunned underwire, because she found it “uncomfortable.” Well, no wonder! After measuring, using the guide from the Butterfly Collection, it turns out that she belongs in a 38E (DD); underwire from a C cup would cut badly into her breast tissue.
Amazed at the change in look and feel (and more definition to her waist), my mom compared being in the right bra size (and this lovely bra in particular) to having had “work done.” She stands taller and looks free and confident.
It’s obvious that the Butterfly Collection is about more than just underwire and bands; Claire feels fortunate to have the opportunity to help full-busted women regain their bodies and love their curves, and is truly making a difference in women’s lives.
Fidelity Denim
According to designer Jason Trotzuk of Fidelity Denim, jeans are your absolute best bet for pants that will give you alluring mystery while resonating with a statement that’s chic, collected and utterly cool.
“When you wear jeans, compared to other common styles of pants, jeans say ‘I’m cool.’ Jeans are credibility,” he says. “Chinos are very casual and nautical and from the Hamptons. You put on a pair of jeans, and you can be from anywhere, from the South, from France, from Berlin — it’s just cool.”
Jeans and Music
The history that looms behind the familiar blue weave of America’s favorite fabric is what provides it with that cool credibility, says Trotzuk. Starting out as the working man’s pant, jeans segued seamlessly into rockabilly and rock and roll culture, dressing the fans and stars of the 60s and 70s, rocking the stage on the legs of Neil Young, Robert Plant and their ilk, and grooving to music as the teens and 20somethings of the free love and spirit generation sprawled out on lawns. Then disco gave denim a new face, and punk gave it yet another — but as much as it changed, it was still just blue jeans under all the extras.
“I was always fascinated by music and rock and roll, and jeans were always a part of it,” says Trotzuk. “You always saw people wearing blue jeans, sometimes they were beat up, sometimes they were embellished. For these people to go on stage and make a statement meant something to me, that just stuck with me.”
Fidelity Denim’s Designer: Jason Trotzuk
Trotzuk, who grew up during the influx of denim, started to make statements of his own. At 18 years of age, he was hand-painting old Levi’s jeans and selling them on Vancouver’s Robson Street for a couple hundred bucks a pop. The painting evolved into sewing and the pants branched out into denim jackets, and soon Trotzuk was making rock-star-worthy gear adorned in velvet flames and lace trim: one-of-a-kind pieces that stood out from the rest.
“My passion in this is making statements with my clothing, and making people take notice,” he says. “In the beginning it was never about money. It was about the impression that I had on my peers more than anything.”
The custom jeans carried Trotzuk through college, until he left to pursue the budding interest the market had in the motorcycle T-shirts he was creating, an item that he says got him into the fashion industry. But by age 30, the designer was “down and out,” and in need of business. He approached a local retailer in hopes of such a break, and was handed a pair of board shorts and asked to produce hundreds more.
Dish Denim
Thousands of private label shorts later, Trotzuk decided he’d rather create his own brand than make money for the other guy, and so the much-loved Dish line was born. As would be the case with any Canadian clothing label, selling board shorts year-round just wasn’t going to happen, so the brand expanded with T-shirts, jackets and, you guessed it, denim.
Plain and simple, the jeans took off. Trotzuk, ecstatic he had returned to his original passion for denim, fell into what he describes as a love affair with Dish jeans — but creating denim isn’t easy work.
“Blue jeans are a tough thing to get into,” he says. “It’s kind of like wine. You have to immerse yourself in it. You have to jump in the denim water, the blue indigo water, and swim around in it, and understand exactly how denim works.”
With a successful label tucked into his designer’s belt, Trotzuk sold Dish in 2004 and went after a new challenge: a Canadian high-end exclusively denim company. Aware of the devotion toward jeans necessary to create a line that would be considered authentic and original by the market, the designer launched Fidelity, a denim brand that aimed to embody the faithfulness its name implied.
Finally, Fideltiy Denim
Fidelity prides itself in a loyalty not only to denim, but also to the customer that wears the label’s jeans. The Fidelity woman is between 25 and 45 years of age, she’s independent and fashionable, but she’s also caring and conscientious, says Trotzuk. The brand then strives to create beautiful jeans for that woman, with a fit that works to flatter a wide range of shapes.
On the surface, it seems there’s nothing unique about Fidelity — the line features classic blue jeans that you could either have worn five years ago, or wear five years from now. What does bring the brand out from the crowd is its dedication to what Trotzuk calls the three “F”s: fabric, fit, and finish. And although the designer admits he doesn’t always manage to combine the best of all three, he’s always pushing for the perfect mix.
“When you get all three of those, boom! It’s a sound wave,” he says. “It reverberates through and everybody loves your jeans.”
Fidelity continues to create superb denim with a unique fit that shapes and holds you in all the right places, with luxurious fabrics that are robust with fullness and character, and in funky cuts that range from tailored pants to a sleek leg to a fabulous flare with extra kick.
“When you put on a pair of jeans, you want to feel good and look good, and that’s what you get from Fidelity,” he says, adding with a laugh, “We sprinkle confidence dust in the jeans so therapy is not required.”
Fidelity Denim Goes International
Originally a purely Canadian brand, Fidelity denim is now sprinkling its dust all over the globe, from such below-the-border hot spots as L.A., New York, and Miami, to the posh boutiques of the UK’s fashion district and Germany. The stars of Hollywood are tapping into the Fidelity frenzy, too, with Eva Longoria, Halle Berry, Jennifer Aniston, Naomi Watts, Kristin Cavallari and Jessica Alba – to name a few – slipping into Trotzuk’s denim.
Fidelity denim has the versatility, fame-factor and tangibility of little else in your wardrobe. Plus, according to Trotzuk, those pistol-hot jeans will do more talking than any other pants you own.
“It’s a statement,” he says of wearing denim. “You’re saying something about yourself. If you’re wearing flip-flops, you’re saying ‘I’m chilled,’ if you’re wearing heels, you’re saying ‘I’m doing damage,’ and if you’re wearing boots, you’re doing even more damage. You can only do that with a pair of blue jeans.”
Lookbook: Valérie Dumaine Fall/Winter 2010
Valérie Dumaine, the label, prides itself in a sleek sophistication that pops with sassy spurts of color and punches of bold fabrics. With an uncluttered style that Valérie describes as “épuré,” this line caters to the sassy fashionista who knows how to pull it together with classic pieces, the right accessories and clean yet bold lines.
Learn more about fashion designer Valérie Dumaine in this Designer Spotlight profile >>
Photos By: Blais-Bilinski.com
Designer Spotlight: Valérie Dumaine
By blending unexpected decades, working with simple yet bold palettes, and polishing it all with her épuré style, Valérie Dumaine has managed to create something new, satisfying that young girl in her – and the rest of us – who always wanted to be different.
In sixth grade, instead of donning the typical prepubescent uniform of Velcro sneakers and leggings, now Montreal-based fashion designer Valérie Dumaine would head to school in high heels, skirts and her mother’s clothes. By age 12, she moved past borrowing and piecing together, and was modifying her clothes with the help of her grandmother’s sewing machine. Her desire for uniqueness taught her to sew.
Born With a Passion for Fashion
“I so badly wanted to have what I couldn’t find in stores,” she says. “There was never anything that was like, ‘Oh, wow! That’s awesome!’ I always wanted to be different.”
Throughout grade school, Dumaine continued to concoct her own sartorial masterpieces and even worked her magic for friends.
She also honed her sewing skills with her father’s girlfriend, who worked within the fashion industry, by heading to her place to whip up garments in a mere afternoon. And when high school rolled around, the annual school fashion shows were speckled with her designs.
The “Wow” Moment
This passion for fashion never faded and Dumaine, now the one-woman-show behind her self-titled clothing label, has created a line that satisfies her appetite for that “wow” moment. Valérie Dumaine, the label, prides itself in a sleek sophistication that pops with sassy spurts of color and punches of bold fabrics. With an uncluttered style that Valérie describes as “épuré,” this line caters to the sassy fashionista who knows how to pull it together with classic pieces, the right accessories and clean yet bold lines.
Valerie Dumaine Fashion
Valérie Dumaine *hearts* Blazers
Keeping in tune with her love of well-cut tailoring and stylistic simplicity, Valérie has a special place in her heart for blazers. And when she was stitching together her own mastery of sewing in her teens and early 20s, it was not until she arrived at LaSalle College in Montréal for the Fashion Design program that she finally learned how to create a lapel – a blazer collar. Now, blazers pop up in each of Valérie’s seasonal collections, each beautifully constructed garment adding a twist to this classic shape.
Debut Collection: Spring 2004
Fittingly, Valérie’s first collection, Russian Disco launched in spring 2004, featured a white blazer that had the designer gasping “wow.” Requiring a re-run after eager shoppers scooped them all up, the snow-white blazer found its success in trim, flattering lines and a black Russian graphic printed on its side. With an interest in Eastern Europe and Asia, and an adoration for fashion of the past, Valérie dipped her collection in the Russian aesthetic and graphic methods of the 20s.
Mod looks were sprinkled with a modern spice, resulting in a clean palette of black, white and khaki that was funked up with puddles of reds and yellows. For this newsprint-esque collection, Valérie worked with fashion/graphic designer Milan of Perplex & Lola to fashion prints inspired by soviet propaganda posters.
Unenchanted
This first collection did not come immediately after her graduation from LaSalle College, but instead after more than a handful of experience-building years on Montréal’s infamous rou Chabanel and after a trip to Berlin in 2002. While working on Chabanel, the heart of the city’s garment industry, Valérie’s dream to start her own line was slowly fading.
“At that point, I thought if this was really fashion, I don’t want to do it,” she says of working on rue Chabanel. “It’s kind of like industrial. It’s the bad companies that do a lot of copying… a lot of copying and a lot of wannabes. Oh god, bad fashion.”
Each year, she’d work a “bad Chabanel job,” spend her summers working at a Chrysler warehouse, and would break it all up with a little traveling. All the while, she was constantly hoping next year’s job in the fashion industry would be better.
Finally, when she took off overseas for Berlin, Valérie knew the job she was leaving would be her last, and the trip she was taking would be the final leg before she started her line.
Finding Optimism Overseas
In Berlin she did unpaid work for young underground designers in the area, investigating the fashion industry someplace that wasn’t Montréal. And from the experiences she garnered and the success she saw in these young designers, Valérie was instilled with new optimism.
“I knew it was possible,” she says. “I was not hopeless.”
Valérie returned to Montréal in early 2003, and soon after applied for – and was given – a young entrepreneur grant, allowing the designer to pour all her attention into her label without worry about work. She plowed through the business plan for the next year, simultaneously producing her line. The first Valérie Dumaine collection hit stores in April 2004.
Uniquely Valérie Dumaine
The exquisite tailoring of her first season has continued to thread through her subsequent collections, and her patterns have matured toward a state of palatable couture. She has left behind the “young street wear” look of screen printing and instead embraced fabrics already infused with patterns.
“It’s kind of like couture, but not high-end,” she says of her line’s direction. “I want people to be able to afford wearing designer stuff that’s not high-end. I do understand why they make their prices like that, but I just want to be more accessible.”
Gathering her inspiration in everything that surrounds her, from vintage record covers to 60s film, Valérie hopes to create collections that ooze with the particular mood that motivated her. She pulls elements from previous decades into her designs, realizing that in today’s fashion, nothing is ever new. But by blending unexpected decades, working with simple yet bold palettes, and polishing it all with her épuré style, Valérie Dumaine has managed to create something new, satisfying that young girl in her – and the rest of us – who always wanted to be different.
Leaf through the lookbook for Valérie Dumaine’s Fall ’10/Winter ’11 Collection>>
Valérie Dumaine’s Website: www.valeriedumaine.com
