For quite a long time now, I have lusted over the look and wardrobe of a very lovely lady on Instagram. Some of you may already know her, and I stumbled across her last year and fell in love with her!

Who am I talking about, you may wonder? Well, none other than Aussie Plus Size Barbie! Or Sydney to her friends.

This young lady has hair to die for, the cutest smile and the most amazing plus size wardrobe that I have ever seen. I lust over everything she wears, and she does it all so well!

Now, where does this link onto Tatyana?

Well, one of the most lovely and unusual dresses I have ever seen was modelled by Sydney, for Tatyana clothing. Having had conversations with her, I know we wear the same size, and indeed have several of the same garments in our wardrobe, so when  I saw her wearing this dress, I just knew it would be something I could fit into.

Now, as this is a company based in the USA, I knew that if I ordered it, I would get hit with customs and import duty, so for this reason alone, had not got around to ordering it.

Then along came Memorial Day weekend in America. I happened to be surfing online, when I saw that Tatyana had a big sale on.

Well, I had to go and take a look, didn’t I!

The dress of dreams, The Judy, was available, in my size down from $134 to $100.50. Quite a good reduction, I thought.

So, why is this dress so different? What is it about it that catches my eye?

As the website write-up states –

“Inspired by military surplus designs, the Judy dress is stylish and moves with grace. This long sleeve circle dress features a collar with three button decoration on each side, two functional pockets with button decorations and shoulder pads.”

In a very unusual green colour, it really is like no other dress I have seen, or certainly own. I had to have it, and as it was reduced, even better.

So whilst I was there, I thought I would go and have a look at what else they had to offer!

I immediately fell in love with a black and white wiggle dress, the Loretta down in price from $119 to the bargain price of $59.50! Into the basket it went.

I then stumbled across this gorgeous jade green dress, the Rita again a massive reduction from $94 to just $47!

Well, in for a penny, in for a pound!

Little did I know how much better it was going to get! When I went to the checkout to purchase my three dressed (with an original RRP of $347) An automatic Memorial Day discount came up, taking off another 50%!!!!!!!!!!

So, my basket which was originally $207 halved in price, to $103.50. And because I had spent over $100 (just) I got free international shipping too. A saving of another $30.

Well, that’s just bonkers. If I carried on, they would be paying me to wear their clothes.

So, of course I had to put the order through, and when exchanged into pounds, came to £70. A total and utter steal, in my eyes! My husband very kindly offered to pay for them, as my birthday present. An ever better bargain than ever!

And so, to wait for the delivery, which because it was free stated 4-6 weeks. I wasn’t in a hurry, and it wasn’t my birthday for 6 weeks, it didn’t matter when it arrived.

Three weeks later, the items arrived at my house. There was a £22 VAT charge – well, £14 and then Royal Mail made an admin charge of £8. Cheeky sods.

However, even with that added on top, the total cost was excellent for the clothing that I had ordered.

So, what were the dresses like? Did they fit? Did I like them?

Dress No1 – The Judy is just absolutely beautiful. The green nubby material is soft, yet substantial. The fit is just divine, and I just need to get all the right accessories and I am sure it will fast become one of my favourite outfits EVER.

I would say that this dress is more an Autumn/Winter dress as the material is quite thick and with the longer sleeves and high neckline, it will be perfect.

The dress has quite an unusual stand up collar, and is done up at the back with an invisible zip. I did find that I needed a bit of help to do this up.

I am off to Twinwood in August, and whilst the weather hopefully will be good, I will probably take this along with me, A) in case we have a bad bank holiday weekend (highly likely) and B) I might be able to get some lovely bits to go along with it.

I am thinking a nice emerald green or cream/beige hat, with black patent shoes and bag. I know what I want, I just need to find it now.

Dress No2 – The Loretta was one that I just loved the look of. The black and white design is timeless and very flattering. Now, this dress is on the smaller side of the 4XL range, so does cling quite a bit. However, I don’t have an issue with that as such. I just need to put it on with my spanx and I will be good to go.

The wiggle dress is made of a very stretchy material, with contrasting white piping and buttons. I really liked the simplicity of the style, but the asymmetrical cut at the front of the dress gives it a bit of a different look. Again, this dress has a rear zip and is has a slighty body-con feel to it.

I intend to pair this up with red accessories, just as in this picture. I already have the perfect hat, although my family all reckon I look like an Emirates Air Hostess when I wear it!

Dress no3 that I ordered was the Rita dress in turquoise. Again another wiggle dress of a stretchy cotton spandex. This really called to me, mainly because of the oversize collar and large buttons. I felt it had such a fitted structured style, and at such a bargain price, it was worth giving it a go.

Unfortunately the contrasting belt was not big enough (a common issue in plus size clothing) but I do have my own belts that I can wear.

The fit of this dress is similar to the Loretta in that it is very snug. However, again the spanx will come into play and it should be ok. A full zip in the back completes the outfit.

I don’t know about you, but this dress just screams “Mad Men” at me. I have some little gloves and intend to match them with my shoes and bag.

So, Verdict? Well, I am pretty impressed with Tatyana, if truth be told. I love the quality of the garments, and of course at the sale prices you can hardly go wrong!

Will I be ordering from Tatyana again? Oh yes, without a shadow of a doubt!

What do you think to my purchases? Would you risk buying something from the States, not knowing if it would fit?

Till next time,

Tx

****Thank you to Sydney Sparkles for the kind use of her photographs****