Vintage Swing Dress

So during our impromptu Peaky D trip, Charley and I insisted that we just had to visit our favourite vintage shop in Bakewell, Mister Bee Vintage. I’ve posted about the shop here before, but it’s now somewhere that’s a regular stop on our trips as we always manage to find at least one thing to take home that we love. In fact, this time I found 3 things – six technically actually, as 3 of them were cocktail glasses (you can actually just about spot them in the top right of this picture from their site), one was this pair of tap pants (I managed to get that post together before work this morning and scheduled in for lunchtime, how impressed are you with that!) and the final thing was this dress.
I’d actually spotted the dress on our last trip to the Peak District when we’d visited Mister Bee, but hadn’t tried it on – I’m not sure why as it immediately caught my eye this time, so I knew I had to try it this time. Vintage sizing is very different to modern, as I usually wear a size 8 or 10, but this is a size 12 and is just about the right fit – I was definitely very concerned about those buttons over the bust doing up, but luckily there’s plenty of room and they don’t pop open or gape, something that happens a lot with modern clothing for me!
I absolutely adored the shape of this dress as soon as I saw it, with a fit and flare kind of style. The label actually calls it a swing dress (and I’ve now completely spaced on the brand name in it!) but it seems to be a 1950s dress. I love the layers in the skirt with slight gathers which give that full effect, and a detail I barely noticed at first: the wide, kimono type sleeves. To be honest, they’re looking a little squished in these photos thanks to the 2 layers I had to wear on top (it was icy, okay?)! So there was a full “outfit” at one point with this dress including cardigan, boots, coat and scarf, but those various layers disappeared when I came inside, and I decided I just wanted some pictures of the dress itself rather than the outfit – so here you go! As I’m sure you’ve guessed, the poofy hair is thanks to being outside in the cold a bit that day, and lack of make up because it was the end of the day and a lot of it had worn off (I tend to wear very minimal make up at the moment anyway), but focus on the dress, people!
Have you had any good vintage finds recently? Here are some more modern day looks inspired by this dress: