Anabel Sexton with petites Jenny and Marta
We’re loving your prints. Why do you think they are so popular?
So many women play it safe with black leggings, but we want women to feel unapologetic about exercising. We have found that our bold prints give women a confidence boost, making them feel much more positive about their workout.
We develop our prints ourselves and have always tried to design patterns and colours that are inspired by people and places that we come across, for instance our leaf and zig zag patterns are inspired by the jagged coastlines and beautiful English countryside of Pembrokeshire – where we did our last photoshoot.
About the cropped lengths, how would you recommend petites to style them on top?
As a petite myself, I am always trying to make my legs look longer than they are – particularly in cropped length leggings. For that reason we make sure most of our tops have raised hemlines on both sides, to accentuate the length of the leg.
I also prefer slightly looser tops as I don’t want to feel too exposed in my activewear, but I also love wearing crop tops layered with vests or throw over tops that you can either leave on or remove. While we have a few long tops, many of our vests and throw over tees are short to ensure that petite women like me don’t look swamped.
3. Do you have any tips for our petite readers, being 5’4 and petite yourself in the fitness industry?
Many people are petite, but they shouldn’t be afraid to create an impact and get noticed.
So my first tip would be don’t ever rule out adding a splash of colour or some bold patterns. It may be just the confidence boost you need.
My second piece of advice is exercise within your own physical limits. I constantly have to remind myself that my little legs can’t stride as far as my friends long legs, but I don’t beat myself up about it.
I just remember that I am doing more than the people on the sofa!
What do you say to women who think they can’t wear activewear, ie they feel they’re the wrong shape?
No-one is the wrong shape for exercise! The ethos of Boudavida is to take away any feelings of self-consciousness and make women feel good about their bodies and inspired to get active.
Activewear can be styled in so many different ways these days, that you no longer have to worry about feeling exposed in skin-tight Lycra from head to toe.
We make a point of designing individual pieces that you can mix and match depending on your body shape and we test our products rigorously on our in-house design team (3 of us are petite and we are all very different shapes and sizes). Knowing we have to accommodate all of us is what makes putting a collection together so much fun.
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