Hey all, I’m gonna take a little pause today before my final construction post. I’m running a little behind but I hope to be back tomorrow! In the meantime, a strap interlude…

This might seem ridiculously simple but I could never figure out which end went where through the slider. Maybe it’s because I’m lefthanded–the visuals always look backwards. So this one’s for the lefties out there!

First I cut my straps. I like to cut each about 19 inches for insurance. The left side is going to be in the back. The right side will connect to the front cup with a ring.

1. Threading the end through slider, with the wrong (often fuzzy) side of the strap facing up. I fold this bit down and stitch a secure seam.

2. Looping the right end up and over and threading it through the slider…

3. Pulling it all the way through to the left…

The straps are sewn at the end but it’s always nice to have them pre-assembled. And I’m glad I checked–I forgot to take my own advice and buy extra strap elastic! The Bra-makers notions kit includes less than 18 inches of it. So you can see in the top photo I changed my game. Thank goodness I had a small bit of my silk left from which to make straps–and they had to be small. They were made super easy thanks to Steph’s very clever rouleau tie tutorial at 3 Hours Past.

My straps are assembled similarly to the nude ones, except the adjustment is going to be in the back rather than the front. How do you like to do your straps? Do you favor the adjustment in the front or back?

Continuing on with fitting adjustments, today we’ll talk through some possible alterations to your cups.

Some tips for working with these alterations:

• Mark in your seamlines on your pattern so that you can measure exactly how much you want to adjust.
• The best way to determine your alteration is by pinning out excess along the cross-cup seams, neckline or arm edges of the cup to see if that helps things fit. If you need more room you could cut a bit into areas of your tester bra to see what alleviates tightness. Measure how much you needed removed or added and write it down. I keep the pins in the bra so I can measure my little “darts” after I take it off.

Overall volume adjustment

If you simply want to add or remove more overall volume in the cup, pinch out darts along the main seams until the cup feels comfortable. Measure out this amount along the cross cup seamlines. Spread or close the dart and redraw the seams.

I’m just showing one adjustment right at the bust point but if you are adding or removing a lot of volume, you may need to make several little darts or slashes along the seams so that you make an even shape adjustment across the cup.

Adding or Removing Lower cup volume

If you notice excess fabric pooling at the bottom of your cup, you may need to remove some of the volume from the lower cup. Pull up the lower cup and see if you can pin some of it out. This adjustment could also help lift the cups.

You will have to adjust the length of the uppercup seamline to match the new lower cup seamline. The illustration above shows one way to do that, by cutting and overlapping to shorten the seam.

Smoothing the apex

If the cups are just too (yes I’ll say this!) pointy, you can always smooth out the apex curve of the cup. When doing this adjustment, start small so you don’t remove too much of the seam length. This is pretty similar to doing the above adjustment. Maddie of Madalynne has a great post explaining cup alterations, particularly this one!

Adding Lift

Both of the above adjustments will add some lift to the bra in some way. If everything fits and you still want a bit more lift, you can try flattening the seam of the upper cup. The flatter this seam is, the more lift a bra has. (Balconette bras with 3-piece seaming often have a totally flat upper piece.)

To make this adjustment work, you will have to remove some length on the lower cup seam so that it matches the new upper cup.

Gaping at the Side of the cup

Pin out the excess along various points of the cup to determine where the excess is. Transfer this to your pattern by slashing and closing the darts, as in the examples below.

Adding underarm coverage

This is an alteration I did to my bra. It could help if you want some extra coverage or support along the side of your cup, depending on your figure. This alteration requires both your cradle/band and the cup pieces which run along your underarm.

Line up the cup pieces and cradle right along their seamlines.

Draw in the new underarm line starting from the band and going up toward the cup. In this illustration, I’m also making my straps further apart on the top of the cup.

Adding more coverage the top of the cup

If you have more breast tissue at the top of your cup and want more coverage, you can always raise the top seamline. Most of the patterns we are using aren’t entirely a “full cup” bra.

This new line can be either totally straight or just slightly curved–a curved line will add a bit more length.

That’s it–I hope these give y’all some good ideas! Tomorrow I’ll be featuring some of the great fitting questions you had for Norma.

Happy weekend all. Let’s talk fitting alterations! I had planned to do just one post on these Friday, but decided it’d better to divide it into two–one for the band and one for cups.

I know that fitting isn’t always the fun part. And especially on something which we may have had trouble fitting in the past and has so much potential to hold our body image captive! But you can get there. Don’t be afraid to slash into your pattern and make little changes with each new bra, even if it’s something you’ve never seen done before. Your instincts are often better than you think!

In fitting your bra, try to pay attention to the fit of your underwire and band first and the cups second. Many problems can be solved by getting the right “frame”.

Adjusting band length

If you band feels too loose or tight, it’s easy to adjust the length. It should fit well on the loosest or at most 2nd hook. The hooks are there for you to adjust your band as the elastic starts to age. And it will age!

1. Draw a line down the center of the band.

2. Cut the pattern along this line and spread or overlap by the amount you wish to take out. (Remember this amount will be doubled in your bra.)

3. Trace and redraw the new band line making a smooth line connecting the pieces (red).

For a band that hikes up

If your band is hiking up, it may be too long so you can try the above adjustment. But sometimes shortening the band isn’t enough to keep it from hiking up. Perhaps your ribcage is narrower below the bust so you need less length along the bottom hem. And every pattern has a different band angle–experiment to find one that works with your body. This is also called a “downward hike adjustment”.

1. If you have a side seam, line up the cradle and the band along the seamline. If your pattern doesn’t have a side seam, draw a line about 2/3 up from the CB to the cup seam.

2. Extend the center back line down by the amount you wish your band to go and place a mark (blue). Extend the side seam line by 1/2 that amount and mark.

3. Slide down and rotate the back band to meet these new points. If you did not have a side seam, you’ll have to slash the pattern along the dotted line. Retrace your new band line (in red, along the seamlines). Don’t forget to add back your seam allowances!

Gaping along the underarm

This is almost the opposite of the above alteration. On my bras, I often had gaping running from the underarm of the cup around the side seam, usually right where the channeling was topstitched down to the band. I finally figured out that this had to do with excess length along the top of the band. The band plays a role in giving some tension to the underwire, but since I had too much length, the excess was crowding at the point of least resistance right inside the cup.

1. Measure out the amount needed to take out the gaping and draw in dart along the front of the band at the seamlines (blue lines).

2. Cut the pattern along the blue lines and close the dart. 2. Re-trace the pattern and draw in a new smooth line (red) connecting the pieces.

Note that if you have a lot of gaping at your underarm, you may need a cup adjustment. Gaping problems won’t be solved by pulling elastic tighter around the cup. I tested out this theory on several bras: the ones in which I pulled elastic tighter actually resulted in more gaping. Pulling elastic tighter while sewing ends up removing more of the elastic tension permanently so it stops behaving as it should.

Bridge adjustments

This little space can take a lot of different shapes! If you find it feels a little tight or loose, but your underwires and cups fit you correctly, try making some adjustments to the bridge. Tiny adjustments, like 1/16″ (1.5mm), can make a difference. Remember that whatever adjustment you make to half the pattern will be doubled.

These are just a few alterations I have experience with but hopefully they give you some ideas! Some great fitting questions have come up in the Flickr group. Thank you all, for being brave to share what you’re working on, and please be free help each other out because we all have different experiences. I’ve also posted some pictures of my tester bras so you can see the gory details. I’ve got a few adjustments to make myself!

Further fitting resources:

Bra-makers Manuals, Volumes 1 and 2. Both are available from Bra-makers Supply and Elingeria in book and CD form. These books explore every corner of custom bra fitting and construction. I love collecting bra-making books–particularly drafting books, which help me understand the theory–but these are really the only ones (I know of) that cover fitting to individual shapes.

If you know of other bra-fitting resources, please share in the comments!

Hello everyone and welcome to the first day of the Bra-making Sew Along!

I am so excited to have such a diverse group of women from all over the world joining along. And I’m glad you all share my enthusiasm for sewing lingerie. New Year, new skills, new bras!

Over the next couple of weeks I’m going to sew along with you and share how I like to make my bras. My personal passion is in design and pattern-making, and I hope to impart how easy and fun it is to do some design magic to a bra pattern. For the first week and a half, I’m going to focus on pattern fitting and alterations for style. A friend of mine enlisted as a volunteer to let me fit her a new bra (lucky gal), so you can follow along basic pattern fitting.

Along the way, please feel free to share your own tips and experience with each other, either here in the comments or in the Flickr group. 50 minds are better than one! And don’t forget we also have Norma from Orange Lingerie joining along with us. Norma is a custom bra-maker who has graciously offered to answer some reader questions in an “Ask the Expert” feature which I’ll include in some posts. Let’s pick her brain and experience!

On an organizational note, I’ve updated the schedule on the central Bra-making Sew Along page so you can see where we are at and what’s coming up.

So, let’s get down to business–measuring business! This will be the longest post but I want to get this out of the way right at the beginning in case you are new to bra-fitting.

bra sizing

The patterns I suggested cover everything from 30AAA to 30H and 32I, up to band sizes 48A to H. These are some of the better-graded bra patterns out there as they have some sophisticated differences between sizes. I know these are missing some smaller and larger band sizes. Bands are a relatively easy thing to adjust if you had trouble locating yours.

And few of us will get a perfect fit right out of any pattern. Two women with the exact same measurements may be different cup sizes. We have various breast shapes, muscle development, and bone structure, which affect our fit. This is why a custom bra can be so wonderful–no matter your size.

For an underwired bra pattern, I have found that the best way to find a starting size is by locating an underwire and band size. If I get those two right, the cups will be easier to fit.

find your band size

To find your band size, measure yourself snugly around your ribcage, right under the breasts. It helps to breathe in and halfway out, then measure. This measurement or closest even band number up is your band measurement.

If this sounds too small to you, try measuring your high bust, just above your breasts and going under your arms. The closest even number to this would be your band. Basically, your band needs to be close to the width of your chest as if your breast tissue weren’t there!

My underbust is 29″/74cm and and my high bust width is 31.5″, and I usually use a 32 band. Sometimes I go down to a 30 in a bra with really stretchy materials. In European sizing, I use a 75.

Note: If your pattern tells you to add four/five inches to get to your band measurement, I recommend that you ignore it! When making a custom bra, you can always adjust the band for comfort by lengthening or shortening later, and most likely you will do this anyway for different stretch fabrics.

underwire fit

Do you know which underwire fits you best? The bra patterns I’ve suggested all use a regular length underwire, but in the future some of you may want to explore using a shorter or longer one, depending on your support or comfort desires. It’s good to experiment!

I found my best wire size by comparing 3 sizes of wires, going one size up and one size down from my usual size.

The wire should closely hug the natural curve where your breast meets your chest wall. No poking into the underarm, sitting on your breast tissue, or dropping below that crease. Underwires increase in diameter by about 1/4″/8mm per size–that’s a really small difference but it could be a crucial one! If you are having trouble finding your natural curve, you could use a washable marker to draw on your crease and see how the wire fits into it. I know that sounds funny but some of us have probably squeezed our breasts into too-small underwires and seeing that crease helps!

For my friend I tried on several European underwires. Her best wire was an 85 and to find the corresponding U.S. wire size, I compared it to the Fabric Depot wire chart. I’ve made a page with links to wire charts, if you need them to compare wires.

find your cup size

For those who want to leave out underwires, one way to find your starting cup size is by subtracting the width of your high bust from your full bust.

I know this doesn’t work for every shape and you need to be wearing a good fitting bra while measuring. If any of you have tips for cup measuring, let us know! If you found an underwire that fits, you can get even closer:

Take your underwire size and compare it to your band size to find a cup size on this chart. My underwire is a 32 wire, so I move over to find my band size and its corresponding cup, a 32B. (In European sizing, a 75B.) My friend’s size is in green.

I know US/UK cup sizing gets a little whacky after D but hopefully the chart makes sense. I don’t think any of the patterns I’ve suggested use the DD/DDD cup sizing anyway.

Some women with very large cup sizes may find that they need a larger cup to go with a smaller wire. Smaller busted women may need a larger wire with a smaller cup. If you have a feeling this might be your case, you can adjust the volume in your fitting.

I hope this information helps! We’ll get to tracing the pattern Wednesday and start in on our tester bras. If you are still having trouble finding your size, please don’t hesitate to ask questions!

But it was birthday week! Around here “birthday day” usually means ‘do favorite things for an entire day at your own pace’, but you can pace it out all week long if you want.

Birthday cuddles with T-bone. Well really, it’s my favorite part of every morning!–he’s a very spazzy cat but I love when he’s so sleepy and sweet.

In my front yard with my brand new hula hoop!

On a recent trip to California, we ended up being in the middle of two hula hoop jams in separate parks. I had no idea how big hooping really was, nor how acrobatic people are with these (I thought, ‘you just go round and round?’), but it is crazy fun. Everybody gets into it, all ages, and everybody laughs the whole time. So I got addicted by the idea and threw a hoop jam over the weekend with friends and all the kiddos. The kids were inventing “robotic hooping” which just makes sense with Daft Punk as soundtrack.

My actual birthday day almost always involves a stroll through a garden of some kind or perhaps a hike through a preserve. Austin is really at its most beautiful this time of year. Things are blooming madly.

Birthday dinner involved beets with sorrel puree, olive oil drizzle and parmesan crisps at Contigo. I’ve been on a serious beet kick this year and this was so perfectly done. (Main course was rabbit stew with cipollini onions and sage dumplings… Yummmm.)

I love to eat.

Contigo is a great place to sit outside and chill over a drink on a warm Austin night. I’m severely proud of my Scottish roots so I always have to have a taste of scotch at the very end of my birthdays and they have a great selection. (This year it was Oban.)

All in all, a perfectly chilled out birthday!