Nice quality clothes from the high street (Per Una)

Member Name: worst_trip

Product:	Per Una
Date:	16/05/09 (137 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Attractively styled clothes with a good range of detail and fabrics

Disadvantages: Some types of stock seem to run out quite quickly

Per Una does some really nice stuff - clothes and bags and womens' accessories, is what I mean by 'stuff'. Poor old Marks and Spencer was a bit of a shopper's disater, just a handful of years ago - and what differentiated their clothes from the slightly depressing ranks and ranks of pastel coloured, mumsy v-neck t-shirts and polyester trousers you'd get in shops like BHS, or the late, unlamented C&A (and bizarrely, still alive and kicking in the Czech Republic, is C&A) was well - basically not a lot.

Certainly M&S still do sell myriad variations on the old-school type of items - if people are still buying, I suppose it would be foolish for them not to - but they've also diversified into more sort of - would you call them 'boutique' or specialized ranges available in store, such as Per Una, and more recently Autograph. These ranges contain much more stylish, prettier clothes, for the 'modern woman' I suppose is what they're aiming at, and on the whole I think this has been a great success for them. It's obvious there's some sort of unifying theme underlying each of the ranges / collections - for Per Una, the theme would probably be something like 'well made clothes in a variety of fabrics, each with areas of interesting detail.' I hesitate to say Per Una clothes are 'feminine' as I think that has some unfortunate connotations, but they do tend to often feature perhaps floral or beaded designs and / or details, and over the years it's been a consistently impressive range.

I have a few favourite Per Una items; a long tweed-effect boucle-tweed fitted coat (brownish) which has a pin-on flower on the lapel (you see - the nice floral detail!) and is lined in viscose. As a congenital hater of the fabric polyester, I customarily search high and low for coats lined with viscose (or better yet, coats that are lined with nothing at all) - but unless you are shopping in a bespoke tailor's in the west-end of London (or so I imagine, never having set foot in one) they are not easy to find. Per Una came up trumps for me here (you see - good quality fabrics!) Another couple of favourites are two tunic-style buttonless cotton shirts, which have wide split cuffs - the shirts are bias cut (see - interesting detail; quality workmanship) and very flattering to the, um, less than conventionally-perfect female figure.

The only slight drawback with Per Una I've found is that the sizing doesn't seem quite consistent across the brand. For example, I'm a size 16 and have found that the bust measurements for various Per Una sz 16 tops varies from about 38 inches (looks right tight on me) to about 40-42 inches (spot on for fit and comfort) to a maxium I've encountered that's not that far off 44. This isn't a function of the stretchiness of the material by any means - it just seems to be - variation.

Of course the other point is that this being a very popular brand, certain items from the Per Una range seem to sell out the instant they hit the shop floor; certain sizes from the new ranges of winter coats, for example, are thin on the ground in-store even a few weeks after these new ranges have just been released.

But these are minor quibbles; on the whole, Per Una's great!

Summary: Nicer than your average M&S