When I heard that Rihanna was launching Savage X Fenty lingerie line, I have to say that I really had some doubts about what was going to happen. I feel like lingerie is such a specialized part of fashion and even very experienced brands sometimes fail to impress me, either by the designs or quality of their garments. Rihanna’s make up line really set people’s expectations high and everybody quickly started making statements about the future of her lingerie line. But make up as nothing to do with lingerie. Actually, I have always been really weirded out by the amount of money the average American woman can spend into make up while I constantly hear people saying that lingerie is too expensive for what it is. I think the issue is that many people just don’t know what is lingerie and the work behind it. Of course make up requires research but let’s just say that it doesn’t involve the same type of human work. Creating a lingerie line, if you want to create new silhouettes and shapes, requires a lot of engineering, skills and creative thinking. It is not cheap. That is why many small lingerie designers just launch 2-4 small collections per year. And many of them can’t afford to create new patterns so often.
From the On the Reg range
On Friday at 1:00 am I still couldn’t access Savage X Fenty website . The traffic was apparently too high and the website kept telling me that I had to wait in the queue. I finally gave up because I had an early course in the morning but when I woke up, many things were sold out. I was happy anyway to finally be able to see what Ms. Fenty had accomplished. Well, she has been impressive as usual in some aspects. I felt like she launched a 3 years old lingerie brand in one stroke. SO many items. Savage is basically self-sufficient. You can get nude, everyday, boudoir lingerie all in the same place. The price range is also very wide, with bras/bralettes from 35 CAD to 86 CAD.
To be honest, as a lingerie addict, these designs didn’t impress me and I didn’t feel the need to think about spending money into them. A lot of items are really basic and look like I have seen them already form other designers many moons ago. However, many aspects of Savage X Fenty are truly innovative. The first thing I noticed, was the diversity of the bodies featured in her lingerie. I had never seen so many women of colour working for the same lingerie brand at the same time. Literally never. The range of nude is so amazing! Five colours from the lighter beige to dark brown. It’s inclusive and beautiful. Plus there are several options of nude bras, not only T-shirt bras. I am glad to see the price of these bras being affordable and the size range, although still too narrow to fit my body, is actually big for such a young brand. You can find bras from 32A to 44DD and briefs from XS to 3XL. I know many people will find this pretty standard but new brands usually have less sizes and would usually stop at a 38 band for many of them. Interestingly the first sizes to sell out were the DD cups. I hope this will incite the brand to keep increasing the size range!
From the Black Widow range
So Rihanna basically created 4 ranges: “On the reg”, “U cute”, “Damn”, and “Black Widow”. I think the idea behind these ranges is rather obvious, and it is meant to provide lingerie for every day as well as special occasions. I am definitely more of a Damn-Black Widow person and I would definitely see myself wearing this floral lace catsuit or this black satin pajama. However, I think I will wait a little bit before buying anything since the size chart is lacking of many important informations. I mean, there is no info about the loungewear sizing, and I don’t like guessing when the shipping and import duties almost double the price of my order.
From the Damn range
I also noticed that some designs are only available for VIP members, aka the ones who paid for a 50$ annual fee in exchange for exclusivity on certain products and free shipping (only for US customers). Honestly, I think you need to be a huge fan to pay those non-refundable 50$ before even trying the brand or reading reviews about it. Nonetheless, some Extra Savage items were already sold out when I woke up on Friday morning. Rihanna has a great fan base indeed.
Some people complained that many items were over-priced, however, we don’t even know yet about the quality of this lingerie. (Of course, some items look obviously cheap looking but not necessarily all of them.) I also wondered about the ethic of the brand. Where and how is this lingerie made? Are the people making it decently paid? I really hope to hear Rihanna on that subject. I love her but the only way I can pay 200$ for a catsuit is that I know it doesn’t carry other women tears with it. Of course, you can’t expect that USA made lingerie would cost 60$ for a bra, but it is feasible to work with a factory abroad where the employees are well-treated. This is every brand responsibility.
From the Damn range
On another subject, I have been really happy to see full-busted plus size women represented on this website. I think the (almost) only time I see this body type represented it’s on indie brands Instagram pages. Many breasts types were represented too. So it felt good to see this on a website that would get so much traffic.
Also, it’s funny but reading the comments and tweets about this line, I realized that for many people lingerie and underwear are not the same thing. Often I read comments from women saying “I guess I am finally going to wear lingerie” but I feel like they really meant lace/satin garments and robes. For me lingerie is everything that goes under my clothes and every pretty thing that I wear only inside my apartment, even if it’s a microfibre thong, so it was really surprising. On the website, interestingly, the “lingerie” category is featuring loungewear and suspender belts, but no bras or briefs, so I guess, this idea of lingerie being only fancy things is quite common in North America. That being said, it isn’t only an American point of view. I have heard many times in my life that lingerie should be extra because it’s made to please your partner, or that you should be so brave and confident to wear basques and stockings. I really love that Rihanna opened the world of lingerie to so many people who thought it was not for them before.
From the Black Widow range
Rihanna managed to create a lingerie line that would suit many budgets and tastes. However, I feel like many people wanted more. And I understand. It’s Rihanna after all. I doubt her lingerie drawer look like Savage. But at the same time, if Rihanna made a Rihanna inspired lingerie line I think the price would be simply unaffordable for most people and then, everybody would be angry and feel left behind. I mean, I would really love to see what she could do if she had the freedom to create something so expensive that it couldn’t sell, but I am sure many people would be frustrated. Most of Rihanna’s fans have an average bank account and I think that she still followed the same state of mind as she did with Fenty beauty. She created everyday lingerie at an affordable price (her foundations and lip sticks were rather affordable) and some more fancy stuff (such as her Body Lava or Fairy Bomb) at a more expensive price. She also included as many body types as possible for a first launch. In my opinion, lingerie is about treating yourself as much as it is essential for everyday wear. I read a lot of people saying that she did nothing crazy and that many indie brands are doing better, but I remember that when these indie brands started I wasn’t included in their size range either and wasn’t feeling represented by their models. Everything must start somewhere and this is an impressive beginning.
From the black widow range
I have so many things to say about this brand. I feel like everybody is now talking about lingerie and this is the first time I don’t feel like I have to not talk about it in public (lol). I feel like lingerie should be seen as normal garment and not always related to sexuality even if it can be. Thanks to Savage X Fenty a lot of people don’t feel ashamed anymore to comment on lingerie pictures on Instagram to say that they really want to wear this or this.
I am really glad. I love to hear different points of view about this subject. Most of my friends are not interested in it outside of the bedroom. I got to ask them what they like or dislike in this new line and I have been so surprise to see that what I loved the most was really ugly or unwearable to them while they were impressed by some bras cuts that I had seen so often already that I didn’t pay attention to them at all. So while a lot of lingerie addicts might find this line underwhelming, for many people some items are real cute. Also let’s remember that Victoria’s secret has been there for way longer and still serve us the same designs for ages with few to no diversity whatsoever and most people I met since I moved to North America think VS and La Senza when it comes to lingerie. So, I mean, Savage is probably at another level already from what I have seen during the 2 minutes it has been existing.
From the “U cute” and “On the Reg” range
This made me realize that while lingerie is my daily bread, it is yet to be discovered and owned by many other women and the fact that Rihanna made such a wide range of products is really game changing. The fact that she could show so many body types wearing the same garments unapologetically is also a lesson for many brands that would spend 10 years with not even one single black model in their imagery. I am not going to lie, I was sad when I saw the first Savage X Fenty pictures on Instagram. I didn’t find it extremely inspired, or impressive at first. But the message behind the brand, and what I have got the chance to see since the launch show a big amount of work and this should be respected for what it is. Of course, you can say that she is rich and many people can’t do this because they are struggling. But nobody should expect the same thing from a one woman independent brand than from an extremely rich celebrity or company. Let’s not compare the incomparable. I hope that in the future, Savage will expend the size range and that the designers will come out with more Black Widow/Damn looking designs!
Let me know your thoughts about Savage X Fenty! Did you buy anything from the brand?
Yours truly,
Wen
So many great points here Wen. I agree that I was not impressed either with the range. It didn’t look very innovative but then as a lingerie enthusiast, my bar is set very high. For many women, these looks are really out there. And it’s good if it gets more women to think of lingerie simply as an extension of their wardrobe, rather than as some special toy just for the bedroom. Great article and thanks for the research.
Interesting point of view. I can only agree on your point on the meaning of the word lingerie. Perhaps it’s a semantic interpretation, but it seemed to me that any bra entered the lingerie category. (I’m French, so the word has probably a slightly different meaning in English)
I found sad that some people only consider lingerie as a sexual thing or as something you wear for someone else. I think this is something you should wear for yourself first, for the sake of feeling comfortable or looking good.
Anyway, good start for this brand, it’s good to point out the variety of designs, body types and shades of skin.
Good to read you Wen, I’ll come back.
I appreciate your review. I am also underwhelmed by the designs, not to mention celebrity products in general. There is just nothing innovative here. The size range is broad for a new brand, but it perpetuates the misinformation that DDD is enormous by claiming to cater to everyone when it in truth doesn’t even really enter the full bust arena. The wide range of nudes is great, but not new, since Nubian Skin was first. And indeed, I also wonder about the ethics of production and the quality of the products, given the pricing.
However, your review is the first to make me consider that it might mean something more to other people, who have very limited exposure to lingerie. By contrast, my exposure to lingerie is fairly high, whereas my exposure to celebrity culture is very low (which means the first I heard of this brand was when it appeared on bra blogs a couple of weeks ago, and I said “meh.”). So it’s probably not a brand with much to interest people with a decent knowledge of lingerie, but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have some good points for another audience.