Luxury Lingerie Review: Fleur Du Mal Star Lace Halter Bra & Briefs

Note: This lingerie was purchased by The Lingerie Addict for the purpose of review. All opinions are my own.

Fleur Du Mal is the brainchild of ex-Kiki De Montparnasse designer, Jennifer Zuccarini. The lifestyle brand offers a range of lingerie, loungewear, corsetry, swimwear, clothing and accessories.  Launched in 2012, the brand now has an impressive range of stockists (including Net-A-Porter, Saks & Selfridges) and intends to open a physical store this year, presumably in the USA.

About the Brand and Purchase Details:

Fleur de Mal is a luxury lingerie label with prices to match. Fabrics include silks, French laces, embroideries, velvet and leather.  I have to admit, I’ve never really paid much attention to the brand. Since its launch, none of its designs have grabbed me as being particularly extraordinary.

Certainly, it seems the brand is committed to beautiful textiles, but the silhouettes and embellishments appear relatively run of the mill. Nevertheless, the brand has curated an impressively focused brand image, and I couldn’t deny my curiosity to study their products in the flesh.

I purchased the star lace halter bra in a 34B (my usual size is 30D, so this is a sister size) and matching briefs in size M (I usually wear a UK 12). With this brand, bras are typically available in sizes 32-36 B-D and knickers in sizes XS-L. These originally retailed at £230 ($297) and £115 ($148) respectively.

Fabric, Construction and Fit:

Both pieces are constructed of a French leavers lace. The knickers pair the lace with a sheer, stretch mesh and the bra incorporates a stretch, matte silk. The bra is a high-neck halter style with lightly padded vertically seamed cups.

The halter overlay is made of the sheer lace with a silk-bound, button up opening along the entire centre seam. It’s finished with a silk bow at the neck and fastens as a halter with an adjustable silk strip and hook. The bra wings fasten at the back with a traditional hook and eye fastening. Plush elastic is used on both the underarm and underband edges.

The knickers are made of panelled lace at the front. The back is largely sheer mesh with a small insert of lace at the bottom. The centre front of the knickers has the same silk-bound, button up fastening as the bra with the buttons reaching all the way through the gusset.

There’s no gusset lining, and the buttons are fully functional, making these knickers essentially an ‘ouvert’ style. Plush elastic finishes both the waist and leg edges.

Stitching is overall neat and accurate throughout with the bra using a combination of lockstitch and zigzag stitches. Curiously, the bra's cup linings are seamed with a French seam. The expensive stitch method seems a little out of place in this area as the lining seam could have easily just been enclosed.

The knickers are mostly overlocked together with zigzag stitches on the elastic. The overlock stitch on the knickers is very tight and neat, though I do worry this might be a little problematic for a lace so fragile and potentially prone to tearing. Both pieces are made in China.

The bra cups and wires fit comfortably. Although I purchased the bra 2 sizes too big in the band, it fits surprisingly well: it has a firm and comfortable fit in the underbust, which makes me suspect this brand can come up quite small. There are also a few problems with the halter neck fastening. Rather than elastic, a strip of silk is used and paired with traditional bra sliders and hooks.

Unfortunately, the silk has a tendency to bunch up and twist. This causes problems both with the adjustable slider (which slides up and down by itself during wear), and the hook (which has a tendency to come undone by itself).  It makes actually wearing this bra out a bit of a challenge. I would prefer a more sturdy material, like a standard bra strap elastic, used at this part of a garment, or a different type of closure.

Although I purchased the knickers in my usual size, they are a bit of a tight fit cutting in very slightly on the legs and waistline. It’s nothing major, but I would personally size up in this brand, just to be on the safe side.

Last Thoughts:

Overall, I’m not particularly impressed in this luxury lingerie set from Fleur Du Mal. The design is nice enough aesthetically, but not particularly striking in my opinion.

Construction is overall good, but there are too many minor niggles with the technical details and fit for me to want to try this brand again. With this particular price point, there are, in my opinion, so many other independent brands with much better offerings.

Readers: How much does branding influence your buying decisions? Have you tried Fleur Du Mal?