Trip To The Lululemon Lab

I had an excursion to the new Lululemon Lab  store in Gastown Vancouver today! This was my first time going to the new location. I happened to have a Dr.'s appointment very nearby today and had caught wind yesterday from the groups that the Lab had a new pair of Nulux tights in so I thought it was the perfect opportunity. It turns out the pants where actually NULU (like the align pants) and not the NULUX I was hoping for, but I found something else I liked better. Good thing too because as I waited outside for the doors to open, I saw that the other tights where being purchased up by phone orders. By the time I got in at the 11am opening they had a stack of the NULU tights behind the counter and they where fielding phone calls like crazy. When I was chatting with the educator it was really funny to hear the ed refer to the lululemon groups as 'the arena'. 

I got to the store at 10:30 but it turns out they didn't open until 11am. 

Rubato Tight (NULU) $128

These where really nice and soft NULU but they felt like the original version of the align crops with the soft really fuzzy (and pill prone) aligns. They had really nice seam detailing across the front and a high rise but I decided that these aren't really very different at all from my much cheaper align pants so I passed on these. 

You can sort of see here what I mean about the NULU. It's incredibly soft but lacks compression and I feel like these will pill a lot faster than the new Aligns in store. 

Nootka Tight (Sculptec) 

These Nootka tights where way better for me. The material is something called 'Sculptec' which is apparently only used at the Lulu Lab. It feels like a luxtreme that is a tighter more compressive knit, and a matter finish. The finish on these is matte in the way that raw silk is. I found these a lot more slimming on me with very similar seam details and very smoothing compression. I purchased these because I see myself wearing them a ton not only to work out in (lifting specifically, not metcon) but also because they are matte I like the look of them for outfits. The seam detail on these was very similar to the above tights. 

**I just tried these on at home and they are quite sheer in a  deep squat so if I keep these I can only wear them casually, not for workouts. 

Here is a cute puppy playing with my kids while I was in the fitting room. 

Really nice compressive and smoothing fit without feeling binding.