Christmas Party: Matalan

I know I already shared my outfit from the evening of my work Christmas party, but unfortunately (I think Ben would actually say “fortunately” to this), I didn’t manage to get a single picture of Ben, despite the fact that he’d got himself all dressed up in a lovely suit from Matalan! He was so pleased when they got in touch offering a suit to him – all the suits he’s owned in the recent past have been from Matalan and he’s loved them all. Unfortunately, a few of these had got on the, ahem, tight side (let’s say that’s due to my washing skills rather than anything else!) and he’d recently had to purchase a new suit for a funeral so had grabbed one at … He was really disappointed that the suit wasn’t brilliant quality from there, even though he’d spent quite a bit of money – it just wasn’t up to the quality of his old Matalan suits. So he jumped on the opportunity to try out another Matalan one for the Christmas party! So, we’ll take a look at the detail of Ben’s outfit first before moving onto mine, but first, apologies for the awful indoor photos! As I said, we’ve been waiting for a day time where we actually are home in the light to get some photos since I didn’t get any at the party, but with Ben working Saturdays and us not being home till after 6pm on weekdays, this was our first opportunity – and if you know what the weather’s been like in the UK (particularly the North) recently, you’ll know why we’re inside! Our wheelie bin managed to make its way down the path, round a corner, up a step and round the back of the house the other evening, if that’s any clue for you of the sort of storms we’re having!!

So here’s the Christmas Party outfit I picked out from Matalan, plus my trusty leather jacket thrown over the top for warmth, making an outfit pretty much complete from Matalan, aside from jewellery! I didn’t realise that until I went to put up the outfit details! The Abbey Clancy range at Matalan caught my eye a while ago, so I was really pleased that I was getting to try something out from it. The dress is a good staple little black dress, but with the added cut outs with mesh, just makes it something slightly different. I’m glad I chose to get the belt too, as it looks a little bit plain without it, and is also slightly too big in the waist, so brings it in. I chose a size up from what I’d normally buy in this, thinking that it would be one of those skin tight dresses, and I was worried about the cut outs being positioned, ahem, wrongly over the chest for me if it was too tight, but actually the material was quite loose, so it wasn’t as fitted as I would have liked in the waist. Definitely a good length though I think, especially with the mesh at the bottom adding that little bit extra length for security. The shoes are fairly comfortable – at least as comfortable as stiletto heels without a platform can be! They’re just slightly wide on my narrow feet, meaning my feet slide down a lot in them (hence the gripping with my toes!), but for a sit down meal at a Christmas party, they’re no problem.