Sexy Stockings for Plus Size Women From Sweet Pins
Samples for this review were provided by Sweet Pins. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
Image via Sweet Pins
I'm pretty much a vintage girl at heart. I live in vintage-style dresses, love vintage hats and purses and embrace the girly vintage aesthetic at every turn. Despite all of this, due to a laughably awful experience with sheer backseam stockings during last year's holiday season, I've never worn vintage-style backseam stockings. Ever tried pulling on a pair of stockings only to find that they stop right above your knee? If you're plus size or even just taller than the average woman, this will be a really familiar nightmare moment.
Enter Sweet Pins, an Austrialian brand who has smartly designed their house brand of stockings to work for both taller women and plus size women. Their review shows several lovely women in very diverse sizes, so when they offered me some for review this vintage-style girl just couldn't say no. It's also National Stockings Day in Australia today, so it seemed like the fates had finally aligned for a review.
As Cora has taught me, these are not authentic fully fashioned stockings. These have stretch added, which I love. If you are looking for true fully fashioned stockings, these won't be on your list. However, if that doesn't bother you then you're in for a serious treat. These stockings are, to put it simply, a wonder.
I was sent two pairs of these stockings: a black pair in the 3/4 size and a beige pair in the size 5. The 3/4 are built for taller women while the 5 is their plus size version. Pardon my total inability to make even length garter straps or straight seams happen --- I'm still new at this! All of these are worn with a great six-strap garter belt that I got from Stockings HQ. Each of these pairs of stockings has a adorable bow design at the top, a sexy backseam down the back and ends in a great heel detail.
Each pair is 20 denier, so they're nice and sheer. Sometimes stockings with heel details don't look great with anything besides a super high heeled shoe, but these work great with my low heeled wedges. These stockings are soft and easy to get on, as well as tough enough that I wore them around for a bit and took photos in them without putting a run in them. I'm notorious for not being able to keep sheer stockings intact through one wear, so that's a big achievement for these stockings! While the stretch isn't traditional, it definitely adds to the comfort factor. These felt great on the entire time.
As much as I like the black version of these stockings, it was the beige and black version that stole my heart.
These were great on my pale skin and had a great dramatic punch with the black details. I will be wearing these with everything, although I do love how they look with my favorite full-skirted red dress. These are the size 5, which also fit my thighs just fine. The tops of these stockings have lots of stretch, so they'd definitely fit a large size range. The review page on the Sweet Pins website does a good job of showing them on a range of women, including some in the 18-22 size range.
While both sizes felt great on, this pictures shows that the 3/4 is probably my real size. There's a hint of bagginess here, but that won't stop me from wearing these everywhere.
I'm so thrilled to see how wonderful these stockings are, not just because they fit, but because enough bad experiences with a certain type of lingerie may put you off it forever. By extending this size range beyond the traditional options, Sweet Pins is helping women embrace their inner vintage movie star, which I heartily approve of. These are going to be a staple in my stockings drawer.
These stockings are available on the Sweet Pins website or through Dottie's Delights. If you buy some during the month of October through the Sweet Pins website, a percentage of the proceeds will go to breast cancer research. If you're in the US, any orders over $100 are eligible for free shipping!
What do you think of the Sweet Pins stockings?
