Marlborough Bra

Now for something a little different and a bit out of my comfort zone....

I made a bra. 

Yep.

You read that correctly.

This had been a bucket list project for a while but before I get into that -

 get ready for some major TMI...

So, in my RTW shopping experiences, I have struggled to find clothes that fit me, including bras. 

I have now and again found a few that fit ok, but I've never been terribly happy with the fit. If the cup fits then the band doesn't or the underwire keeps poking me.

 All this being said I really hate shopping for bras. 

Like really really hate it. 

I've always known I could make my own wardrobe down to my socks. The fact that I could make my own underwear was daunting. I thought that it would be too hard and I was ok wearing $10 Target bras. But after reading other blogs I decided to at least buy a pattern, then I'd work from there.

This was back in July.

Fast forward to December and a bra making shop that I followed had an end of the year sale. Armed with my Christmas money, I bought a kit from Tailor Made Shop (it is sold out now but look at all the other pretty kits!!!). 

I was instantly taken with this kit in particular!

 I absolutely love the color combination! 

So I ordered this kit to go along with the pattern I bought, the Marlborough Bra from Orange Lingerie, then started to research.

Let me tell you! The lace is heavenly! So soft and easy to work with! The quality is marvelous and the color choices are beautiful and unexpected! It came with everything I needed except for the underwires.

I bought the underwires from them, too, which I did have to trim to fit the pattern, but otherwise actually fits!!!

On to the pattern itself! 

Like I mentioned before, I have a tough time finding properly fitting bra cups. They are either too big or too small and if they do fit then the band size is too small (or underwires poke me). 

When I was measuring myself for the pattern I found out I'm in between sizes.

 Which doesn't surprise me at all. 

 So I rounded up to the nearest cup size (per instructions) and worked from there.

 I couldn't really try it on until it was completed..... so I am using this bra as a wearable mockup.  However, I'm incredibly pleased with the fit!
I will do things a little differently next time...I'll elaborate towards the end of this post.
 But fit wise this pattern was perfect!

I need to work on my pattern placement a bit but I'm happy overall with it.

This pattern was pretty easy to work with. I did need to reference the web for a few things. Overall the instructions were clear and the information helpful.

The fit is very comfortable and this is one of the few bras that don't slip off my shoulders! Well, okay, it does a bit but I have sloping shoulders. If it has a strap then 9 times out of 10 it will fall off.

I also liked the way the straps were attached. The slider adjusts at the shoulder (for me it's right behind the shoulder) instead of closer to the shoulder blade/band area. Which makes for easier adjustment.

I loved being able to work with small pattern pieces! A nice change from my usual "I'm cutting everything out on the floor because my table is too small".

I'm fairly pleased with my construction but there is definitely room to improve.

 First off the hook side of my back fastening is awful! 

It should look like the loop side (See above picture), see how nice the satin stitching is?

A complete monstrosity on the other side.

Here's another example of things I can improve: 

To attach the elastic you first zig-zag on the picot edge, the trim, fold over, and zig-zag the opposite edge.

 My mistake was I zig-zagged on picot edge after folding over which isn't as nice looking. I might fix it but it works for now. 

Also, I think, after reading a few blogs, that I should use a triple stitch zig-zag instead. Which is basically a zig-zag but each straight edge is made of three normal stitches instead of one big stitch.

Here is a close up of a strap and the lovely sliders!  The hardware is very nice and durable!

Needless to say, I'm hooked! (haha...see what I did there??) I'll definitely be making more soon!