BRAugust and a Monowire Bra Design Challenge

BRAugust is a month long photo a-day Instagram challenge hosted by Ying of Tailormade and is a great place for sharing makes and ideas. My favourite posts were the monowire bras of @EvielaLuve and @Miniguinea so I challenged myself to design a bra using a monowire. I am just so pleased with the result.

I had made the Madalynne Simplicity 8711 which uses a monowire in a floating bridge and luckily I had ordered an extra monowire and I thought the floating bridge pattern piece would be a great place to start. I loved the idea of the plunge neckline but thought I would need more support at the centre front. Then I remembered the Hari Ito Rafale bra I had made. This is a partial band double layered cup pattern which uses extra long wires for an open centre front. How to combine the two?

The outer cup of the Rafale is mesh but I found that this stretched out too much on the one I had made previously. The alternative was powernet but I didn’t think this would give the soft round shape I was after so I thought of using the flocked powernet from Sewme which had been in my stash for a while waiting for the right project. I wanted the inner cup, frame and band to be the same colour and the Dusty Mauve tulle and powernet from Tailormade looked perfect. Time to sketch a design.

I wanted a sheer look with clean lines. First, I started with the cups and then drew the shape of the monowire so that the outer cup would attach to the frame where the monowire started to go horizontal to cross the front. To accommodate the design I planned to put the channeling on the outside The top edges and neckline would be fold over elastic and the bottom band would be matt strap elastic.

To combine the patterns I started with the 34D pattern pieces for both. For the frame I added the seam allowance to the wire line as the channeling is applied on to this in the original pattern. I took off the seam allowance at the underarm as I was using fold over elastic and I added the width of the strap elastic I was using to the bottom so I would have some of the tulle showing. The Rafale does not have seam allowances so I added these to the dart and cross cup seam. For the wire line I adjusted from a partial band to a full band.

It’s a great feeling when you lay out your pattern pieces and think, yes, this is going to be beautiful. I used two layers of tulle to provide enough stability for the bridge and to enclose the cup seams. At this point I decided to use the matt side of the fold over elastic as the shiny side just looked wrong with the clean lines of the rest of the design. Luckily I had some matt strap elastic which would match perfectly. Now I had to put it altogether to see if it worked.

First I made up the darted cup and finished the front edge with elastic. I then made up the tulle cup and I suddenly had a brainwave to enclose some slimline plastic boning from Madalynne in the fold over elastic from the outer cup to the top of the bridge. I attached the two cups together and then sewed in to the frame wrong sides together so I could attach the channeling to the outside along the same stitch line.

I’m not a big fan of channeling on the outside and originally thought i would cover with fabric as EvielaLuve had done but I didn’t have any fabric fine enough so as not to make this area too bulky. I have quite a stash of black channeling and did find some smooth enough to use on the outside. Having sewn this seam wrong sides together it also made the inside neater and more comfortable.

To finish I applied the fold over elastic to the armhole and the strap elastic to the bottom. When attaching the straps to this sort of back I like to attach from the bottom band and bar tack both here and on the top band as I find this gives more stability. I also like to add stabiliser to the elastic where it is folded over the ring so it doesn’t stretch out. With the bra finished I now had to design matching underwear.

My thoughts were to match the lines of the bra especially the cut out. I immediately thought of the EvielaLuve Binky as I love the fit and the front is deep enough to accommodate the same size cut out. I sketched out my idea and thought of adding sections to the back to break up the mesh.

To help determine the proportions of the design I made up the front pattern piece by flipping the original pattern piece and tracing to give a complete front. I decided on the placement of the side pieces, then lay the bra over the centre front and drew in the the cut out and then drew a line from the side to the cut out continuing to the centre front. On to the construction.

I started with the back. The closest colour mesh I had was a blush also from Tailormade. I used two layers to balance the powernet panel and it enhanced the colour. Rather than create bulky seams I just overlaid the elastic on the complete back piece. The elastic was one I’ve had in my stash forever but is matt ready folded almost to the point I didn’t realise it was folded. I thought it would be perfect as it isn’t as bulky as regular fold over elastic.

In the design I had a one piece front panel but when I thought through the construction I needed to have a centre front seam to create the V. I applied the fold over elastic to the top edge before I sewed the centre front seam. I pressed open and topstitched to keep flat and trimmed back to the stitching. For the centre mesh panels I added a seam allowance which would be placed under the elastic of the panel once I had added the elastic to the front of the panels. Then I attached the side panels and covered the seam allowance with the elastic.

With the front and back pieces completed I finished as normal. The pattern has an enclosed gusset which is done next. To finish I attached the waist and leg elastic in the round. For the leg I had the join at the elastic strip on the back as it is almost undetectable at this point. For the waist I placed at the centre back. My set was now complete.

This has been what I call a labour of love but thankfully it all worked out and I finally might get some sleep.

Knowing all the patterns I used fit is a very good starting point so I did expect the bra to fit. The unknown was how the boning at the centre front of the inner cup would work and I am thrilled to say it worked well. The original design had a ring at the centre front and the fold over elastic would be wrapped around. As I got to that point I decided to go straight across the neckline from one cup to the next. I am so glad I did as think it would create too much bulk and not sit flat against my chest.

I just had to add these pictures which show just how beautiful it all looks.