This post originally appeared at Rebel Angel.
[This review contains affiliate links.]
Over the past couple of years, I’ve seen American bloggers and vloggers talking about a service called Stitch Fix which is an online personal styling subscription company. I always thought it sounded fun to receive a parcel of surprise clothing items in the post that were tailored to your style – I love the idea of someone else picking out clothes for me! – but was sad that they didn’t offer it yet in the UK…until now!
I was targeted a personal shopping website on Facebook which prompted me to check out Stitch Fix again and I noticed a pop up telling me it was coming to the UK. I signed up and was notified at the beginning of May that it was now live, so last week, I decided I’d give Stitch Fix UK a go.
What is Stitch Fix UK?
Stitch Fix UK is a personal shopping website where a personal stylist takes into account your size, style and what you’re looking for then sends you a handpicked box of clothing to try. The service has a £10 styling fee which is applied as a credit to anything you keep from the box, and if you choose to keep everything, you receive 20% off the entire Fix.
If you sign up to Stitch Fix UK through my link here, you can receive £15 off anything you choose to keep!
The website was super simple to use – you simply sign up then fill in a style profile survey which asks you about your height, weight and sizing – including not only dress and shoe size, but individual top, bra, skirt and jeans sizing. You’re also asked to characterise your proportions for arms, shoulders, torso, hips and legs.
The next page asks about how you like your clothes to fit on your top and bottom half, asks about styles you generally prefer and which body parts you prefer to cover and which to flaunt.
Then it’s all about your personal style, presenting you with images of outfits, asking you to rate them with “Yes”, “Somewhat” and “No” followed by the different occasions your boxes can focus on, where you usually buy clothes, how adventurous you want to be, what styles you usually wear, what type of clothing you’d like to receive (on a scale of “Often”, “Sometimes” and “Never”) and things you’d like to avoid.
Then there’s a page with options for budgets and price ranges – you select from dropdown lists how much you’re willing to spend for the items you receive, categorised by item.
Finally, you answer a few questions about yourself – how old you are, what you do, whether you’re a parent. Here there’s the option to link to your Pinterest so they can see your style there and a box to include more information.
As you can see, it’s very thorough!
What was in my Stitch Fix UK box
Okay, so I have to apologise here – I didn’t take any photos of the items. BUT, I have screenshots from the video I recorded all about Stitch Fix – so that’s better than nothing right?!
So inside the box were a few pieces of information – one on how Stitch Fix works, two about the items I had in my box – and a postage bag to send the items I didn’t want to keep back. Underneath were the clothes themselves wrapped in tissue paper.
The information card about the items includes a note from your personal stylist introducing themselves and explaining why they chose what they did for you. Mine not only mentioned the Italy trip that I’d included in my note, but also took into account the fact that I was breastfeeding and talked about how she’d used my Pinterest to inspire her choices. The rest of the card shows you a couple of outfit suggestions per outfit, including accessory and shoe styling which is a wonderful addition to the box, especially if you’ve received an item that’s outside of your normal style. I noticed on mine that she’d reused a few item suggestions, such as a denim jacket, which is a really nice touch to get you using your wardrobe more.
So onto the clothes themselves! My box included one top, three dresses and one skirt, from four different brands – Joules, Monsoon, YAS and Vero Moda. (And again, apologies for the weird photos – apparently I was doing weird faces in the video!)
The top above was from Joules – it’s a simple white cotton broderie anglaise design with a peplum hem. My stylist suggested that it could be worn with jeans, or even with the skirt she included – as you can see to the right! I loved this top a lot – it’s simple but classic and can be worn in a variety of different ways. Priced at £39.95, it’s more than I would usually choose to spend on a top, but I decided for me, it was worth it so I’m keeping this one.
The skirt is from the brand Vero Moda and is a kind of brown leaf print. While I kind of like the look of it on the hanger, I’m not so keen on it when worn on me. I wasn’t a fan of the elasticated waist with the straight skirt style, so it felt a little bit grannyish to me, especially with the midi length – I think I prefer midi skirts fitted or very full – so I decided to send this one back.
This dress is from a brand called YAS and was £60. It’s not a brand I’d heard of before, but searching it online, I quite like the look of it. This dress was one that had clearly been very well considered for me – it has buttons down the front that make it ideal for breastfeeding, it has a tie waist to highlight my smallest feature, and it’s a classic but stylish shape and cut for our holiday to Italy. It’s pretty much the perfect dress for my wardrobe right now!
The only teeny problem is that it’s a little tight over the bust at the moment, but then again, I am sporting a pretty large cup size thanks to breastfeeding plus a little extra baby weight – I’m not rushing to get back to pre-baby size but I imagine by the time we go to Italy, they’ll be a liiiittle smaller! Plus everything is tight on the bust for me right now, even when I go up a size or two, so what else can I do?!
The pink floral dress is from Vero Moda, is a wrap style with flouncy frills around the hem and neckline and costs £30. While I do like the look of this one, even though it’s not quite my usual style, I ultimately decided not to keep it, mostly because I didn’t think I would have the opportunity to wear it often enough. It looks like something I could wear to a wedding and, while I have two coming up, I already have an outfit for one and the other I think needs something a bit fancier. It’s also not quite casual enough for every day in my eyes.
Finally this yellow dress is from Monsoon and costs £55. Again, like the other two dresses, she’s taken into account here that I’m breastfeeding, with buttons down the front, and it also highlights my waist with the tie and is pretty and floaty for Italian weather. I also did very much like this dress but chose not to keep it in the end as it was quite similar to a couple of other pieces I already had in my wardrobe and, since one of my main goals with Stitch Fix was to help pare down my wardrobe, I thought I’d be better not duplicating on styles I already own.
Did I like Stitch Fix UK?
Short answer: yes! I loved it!
I really liked the element of surprise as well as liking the items I received, but on top of that, I think the service was fantastic. My personal stylist was very thoughtful – she took into account everything I mentioned, from my trip to Italy and wanting classic clothing for that, to the fact that I’m currently breastfeeding. She also took a good look through my Pinterest to get an overview of my style aspirations and chose items based on that.
I also loved the option to be so thorough with sizing and proportions in the survey as my body varies a lot from top to bottom, and even in skirt sizing too, so it meant they had a good overview of my body rather than simply “size 12”. You can update this, as well as any aspect of your style profile survey, at any point. I also discovered that any time you go to the website, you are presented with a “Style Shuffle” – a gallery of clothing to give thumbs up or thumbs down to so that your stylist can get even more of an idea what you like. You can also pop back onto the website to leave your stylist a note and you can provide feedback on the boxes you’ve received too. I imagine it only gets better as you go on with them!
One big benefit of the service is that, if you choose to keep all 5 items, you receive 20% off the entire order. If you choose to purchase any item from your Fix, you get the £10 styling fee as a credit. I kept two items – the Joules top at £39.95 and the YAS dress at £60 – meaning that my total came to £89.95 as the styling fee was taken off.
In addition to this, the delivery is free and returns are free. Had I ordered these 4 separate items from their own stores, I’d imagine I’d have had to pay delivery on them and possibly pay for returns; instead with Stitch Fix UK, you get the chance to try items from different stores at home for free.
I also need to add, as I mentioned in the video, I wasn’t able to return the items after the 3 days I had to try them on as Emmy was in a cranky, slightly poorly mood, so we weren’t able to get out. I jumped onto their customer service and sent them a message explaining, and I almost immediately had a response that it wasn’t a problem and they would extend my return date for me. This is excellent customer service and I was really pleased that they were willing to be so flexible!
So will I do it again?
Yes! I signed up for the 3 monthly box so that I wasn’t too tempted and spending too much money…but I’m planning to get another one before my next August delivery as I enjoyed it so much and because I’ve got a couple of things I’d like my stylist to pick out for me. I’m super excited for the next one!
And don’t forget, use my sign up link for a Stitch Fix UK discount here to receive £15 off your items!
