Gossard’s Vintage Rose padded plunge (30-38 A-G) caught my eye against my will. Gossard are on The Naughty List for using a +4 calculator with no fitting advice whatsoever, and giving them money is the last thing I want to do right now.

But maybe I’m being to harsh to Gossard. This is their bra, after all. They made it, and they know how it should fit. I should give them a chance. It is very beautiful, after all…

Their helpful bra size calculator informs me I am not the 30G I thought I was, but a much more conventional 34D.  This seems a bit off, but they do say that:

“Please note that this calculator is intended only as a guide and is most accurate between cup sizes A-DD – it should be used as a starting point for finding your perfect fit. Because we know every one of our Gossard Girls is unique we recommend that ladies with a cup size of above a DD get fitted in-store for an accurate measurement.” 

I’m a 34D, so this should be just about ‘accurate’ for a ‘starting point’. There are no visual guides to what I’m looking for beyond that ‘starting point’, so I’ll just look at their models to make sure I’m on the right track.

In a 34D, the Vintage Rose presses my boobs back in to my chest, creating a two large and smooshed orbs. It feels kind of precarious and I have quadraboob, but from what I can tell from the website that’s about right. The center gore is not on my sternum and the wires aren’t encasing my boobs – usually a deal breaker for me, but looking at the model I think that’s how it’s supposed to be. I can feel my boobs shifting and have to tuck them back in to position often to keep the bra sitting in the right place – but the models are just standing kinda vacantly doing nothing, so perhaps that’s my fault for moving around.

I definitely have a Christina Hendricks thing going on, and I’m pretty sure this is the sort of cleavage that could stop people noticing what my face looks like. But this Vintage Rose is just not comfortable. I’m surprised that an established brand like Gossard would bother making a bra that can barely fulfils its primary function. It’s hardly containing my boobs, and the squish is hot and uncomfortable. I can’t do anything without having to readjust – which I imagine would be kind of embarrassing if I were at the office or on the train. As a bra reviewer, the Vintage Rose 34D is hopeless and definitely not for me. Though perhaps, if I didn’t know what a bra should feel like, I would probably keep it – I mean, that’s what all bras feel like, right?

80+% of women are wearing badly fitting bras. Gossard: your ineffective and overly simple fitting calculator, especially combined with the hopeless fit of your models, is part of the problem. Your misinformation keeps women in a fit that is uncomfortable and unsupportive, keeps them hating their body and assuming that they are freakishly big and simply stuck with boobs that can’t stay in bras. I’d say your customers deserve better than that.  Take a look at your website, remove that calculator and think again about what a message like “get the perfect fit” actually means. It’s time to change.

This is the War on Plus Four.

P.S: when trying the bra in a rather better starting-point size of 30G the Vintage Rose is is not a bad little bra. It runs firm in the back and slightly small in the cup, and gives a lovely shape. It would be a great purchase for women with boobs that tend to be more dense at the bottom. Or at least, it might be if you had a good understanding of your own bra size and what constitues a good fit…

The misinformation must end!