I was recently invited by Very.co.uk to try an item of clothing from their website. I knew there’d be no problem finding something – with Holly Willougby’s curve-friendly collection and plenty of stylish stuff in the Love Label range, the most difficult thing was actually narrowing it down. I eventually decided to go for something a bit special from vintage fiend Jasmine Guinness, and picked her ‘Queen of Hearts’ dress, a 50s style number with a cute heart-print peekaboo hemline that was very Alice in Wonderland…

In short, I love it! It’s a fab bright colour (closer to the red in the centre pic than the pinkish colour it looks in my photos) and the heart print trim is very cute. The shape is flattering, and a nice modern take on the 50s. Most importantly, the fabric hangs well and doesn’t seem to crease too badly, and there are pockets! All dresses should have pockets!

I would have preferred a fuller skirt for an even more retro look, but the benefit of something more A-line is that it doesn’t blow up in the wind as easily as a full-on circle skirt.

I was a bit worried about the sizing when I ordered – reading the reviews on the site some people said it was true to size, others said it ran incredibly small. I found the fit to be pretty identical to the size chart, meaning with a size 14 I had my usual ‘small on the boobs, big on the waist’ issue! The dress came with a belt in the same fabric, but that quickly got shoved to the back of the wardrobe as it keeps slipping. I added an elasticated belt from Primark instead, which worked fine, but I would love something with a heart-shaped buckle, just to up the twee level even more!

Sadly the dress seems to have disappeared from the virtual shelves in the last day or so (it was there last week when I tweeted a pic!) but fingers crossed it’ll return when there’s more stock. In the meantime there are plenty of other women’s dresses on Very that are just as fab, including a great Jasmine Guinness tea dress. I also spotted a size 14 on ebay for less than the RRP of £49!

Disclosure: The dress was provided free of charge by Very for review purposed. However, the thoughts are my own and I was not paid to publish them.