A Beautiful Orange Dress | Freak Factory SS13

I learned something when putting this look together, or should I say I learnt from my own advice. It’s very easy when being asked for style tips to dish out the same old advice that you’ve always sworn by – and one day you realise you’ve not been following it yourself. So if you can bear with my ramblings in this post it might make for some insightful reading…! 

So this rather fabulous orange dress was loaned to me by Lithuanian womenswear brand Freak Factory – when they contacted me last year to ask if I wanted to borrow some pieces to style in a post, I did hesitate over whether borrowing designer pieces was a direction I wanted to go in with my blog. But nothing ventured, nothing gained as they say… I had to try it at least once in order to decide. (I did actually borrow a tote bag from another brand a few weeks ago, and what I found was that the bag inspired a whole outfit that I may not otherwise have put together. So with that in mind, I decided that I should give not just an accessory but an actual item of clothing a try as well.)

The description of the Freak Factory brand sounded particularly appropriate to my style:

“Freak Factory is a fashionwhich represents the style of self-confident, free, brave and innovative women. Every season, a wide spectrum of high quality and exclusive clothing delights customers unafraid of bright and bold style statements”.

I can really relate to that – the brand seemed to be tapping into my sartorial psyche with that statement (or my desired one at least)! So I chose a couple of outfits from their Spring/Summer 2013 collection: this orange terry cloth and jersey dress and a purple top/skirt (to be seen separately in a couple of weeks or so). I decided to contrast the orange with my chunky blue chain necklace and my rainbow bright wool Asos heels which picked out both colours. (I’m a little obsessed with orange and blue at the moment – I’ve been pinning loads of outfits in that colour combination – so it seemed an obvious accent colour for the lovely warm rusty-orange of the dress.)

The verdict? I’ll be honest: I really wasn’t sure about the dress at first… either on the hanger or me. I quite liked it, but I did think I was a bit too busty for a sleeveless jersey dress. Both the design and the quality are beautiful, however, and the dress retails at €219/£185 (which is rather out of my price range, but that’s about the same as a Reiss or Karen Millen dress which are available on most high streets).

BUT! here’s where my advice was heeded not sooner but later. The fact that I tried it on and photographed it has proved my own point to me; something I always say when asked for a style tip is to not only use a full-length mirror, but also photograph yourself in the outfit and study the image on a monitor (not just on the camera screen). Now that I’ve seen the images on a computer screen, I actually like the dress on me much more than when I looked at myself in the mirror. Whilst it isn’t the perfect dress to flatter my very skinny, very white arms and quite ample chest(!), it does prove my point that you should venture out of your comfort zone every now and then and try on something you’d normally never even vaguely consider. So the dress has grown on me – I’m pleased with the styling and the colour combination is lovely.

I think even fashion bloggers can get in a style rut every now and then, and if we don’t want to try something new – who else is going to?!

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Shop my look! Items marked* are the actual items, if still available:

Dress: Freak Factory* (on loan), Jacket: Very, Heels: Asos*, Tights: Unknown, Necklace: House of Fraser (old), Earrings: F+F at Tesco, Watch: Asos, Ring: Asos

And if I’ve tickled your fancy for orange dresses (mine certainly has been!), how about these..?

Thank you to Freak Factory for the loan of this item. Please note I have not been compensated for this post; all opinions are my own, however.

Linking up to:

Visible Monday at Not Dead Yet Style
Monday Bloom at DC in Style
Monday Mingle at Momtrends
Share Your Style Saturdays at Claire Justine oxox
Creative Mondays at Claire Justine oxox
Yolo Mondays at Still Being Molly
Wardrobe Wednesdays at Kiwi Women’s Style
What I Wore Wednesday at The Pleated Poppy