The Heart Crop is a BDSM crop made from Ruff Doggie Styles. It's made from leather, suede, and a type of nylon and is about two inches long. The handle is about six inches long and is made from woven leather. The body of the crop seems to be some nylon fabric covering a flexible, plastic inner core. The heart on the end is made from suede (the pink side) and leather (the black side). The suede has hearts cut into it to make the texture. EF sells this in pink/black, but the company also makes it in red/black. The handle includes a leather strap around the handle to make it easy to hang this when it's not in use.

The packaging for this is pretty basic. It just comes in a little plastic bag which isn't meant for reusable storage. At the bottom of the crop, there is a small tag which gives the name of the product and the product description. It's easy cut off with a pair of scissors.

I have to say I was slightly disappointed in the craftsmanship of this one. The rest of my Ruff Doggie Styles items are seriously high-quality - the floggers and the cuffs. However, I seem to be having bad luck with the riding crops. Most end up pretty low quality for me. On this one, the wrist strap isn't actually pulled tightly it's supposed to be, so it just flops around instead of clinging to the handle like it was made to. On the shaft of the toy, some of the nylon fibers are starting to come out of their weaved pattern. On the heart, there's lots of suede fibers falling off, an odd stain on the heart, and on the backside of the heart (the black side), you can see the stitching wasn't done very well. It's really odd for me considering that most of my other Ruff Doggie Styles products are usually really high-quality.

I had some reservations about this crop. The first crop by this manufacturer I owned came out of the handle after a bit of play. The second one worked great. So which way was this one going to lean? Well, it's sorta in the middle. The make of the crop seems a little sloppy than I'm used to, but the crop seems to work okay besides that.

The handle is extremely comfortable in my hand. It feels pretty high-quality, and it's made large enough that both male hands and female hands should fit pretty comfortably on the handle. The leather strap is supposed to be tight enough to stretch over the end of the handle and keep it out of the way during use, but this one seems really stretched. so it annoying flops around during use. Aside from that, the handle is about what I'd expect from a riding crop.

The body of the riding crop is pretty flexible. It will bend about at a thirty degree angle in any direction during use. The flexibility happens towards the end of the crop - not near the handle. I'm not sure how I feel about the flexibility. It made the swings hurt more, but it also made it harder to control. Coupled with the fact that this crop seems a little awkwardly long, it was a bit harder to control than other crops that I have.

The tip of the crop does swing during use. This is a good thing. If struck roughly, it made the tip more painful and if used lightly, it gives a bit of a "thud" to receive the desired "hit" effect. The tip does seem pretty well sewn on, and I wouldn't expect it to come undone. I'd expect the crop shaft to come out of the handle long before the tip falls off. The tip is held on by tightly bound string, though, so if the string ends up ripping, the tip may hang off loosely. Something of note about the tip: Because the crop is so flexible, it's really difficult to get the heart imprints to stay on your victim. It works, but you have to hit really roughly and make sure that your bottom stays still because this one can be a bit hard to aim because of the flexibility.

So how does it hit? If used lightly, the boyfriend says it's really pleasurable and playful and doesn't sting at all. He says that the crop, while getting a bit of force behind it because of the flexibility, it doesn't seem to matter much when the crop is used lightly. If used roughly though (and I really recommend getting your bottom to sit still or you may have a problem aiming it), the hearts from the crop do lightly appear, it will redden the bottom of your submissive, and it definitely stings. When used roughly, the flexibility of the crop actually works with it, making the hit of the crop much more stingy.

Overall, though, the Heart Crop is a cute little crop that works well for what it claims to do - it works well as an impact toy. However, it probably won't hold to rough BDSM use, so this is more for beginners and intermediate users - not for those that want to go all-out on their crop. However, for an inexpensive riding crop that will work great for light use, this is adorable, non-threatening, and perfect.

We still like our Heart Crop. The Flower Crop we bought was starting to break, but I'm surprised to say that, despite some of the quality issues with the crop, it hasn't started breaking or anything like that. It still works just like a regular crop though the flexibility and length problems haven't changed at all. It's a cute crop, and people are drawn to it, but it's not of the highest quality.