An easy project

Making a bra is an easy project for me. I’ve made lots in the past years. I don’t even remember properly when I started making them, but as the lady who took care of my children when they were little (when I was at work), introduced me to it, it’s quite safe to say it must be at least 15 years. And I still like making them. After intense projects or in a period of lacking mojo sewing lingerie is often my next step.

Today I started on another set, all the parts for a bra and two accompanying panties are cut out. The bra is partially done.

For this bra I wanted the lace, which is only a border lace, to follow the bottom of the band into the side. I made quite a lot of tutorials about sewing but they’re all quite old now, so might be time to update a bit and/or show you what I did.

In the picture below you see the pattern piece for the part that’s beside the cup. It will be joined with the the band for the back (the lycra you see in the picture above).

I folded the lace in an angle and at the botton you see the lace does not complete follow the line of the pattern. From experience I know that’s not a huge problem.

Before unpinning completely I marked the foldline with water soluble marker.

This is how the pattern piece looks after cutting and unfolding.

Pinned the marked lines, right sides together.

Stitched the seam

Folded the seam down. When sewing on the elastic the little piece sticking out in the corner will be folded to the back.

 

(the black lines in the pattern are not completely straight, I followed the light pencil marks to make the photos clearer and did not use a ruler at that point).

Making a panty - Cutting lace

As I made my bras last week, I forgot to take the pattern of one panty with me and cut this out just now. As I mentioned in a post at the beginning of this week, I'm considering writing a tutorial about making a bra, but that must wait a little longer. So I start with a panty (strange word, as we call a panty what in English is called stockings I believe, what in English is called panty, we call slip, very confusing).

Before explaining how I make a panty (or perhaps later on a bra), let me say that I learned these techniques from 3 different teachers in courses or workshops and from information from books and the internet. So I'm not a professional sewing teacher, and not saying that my description is the only right way to do it. There can be better ways perhaps, this is only how I do it.

For panties you need the following:

• lycra
• lace (optional)
• small piece of cotton (for crotch lining)
• edge elastic
• narrow lingerie elastic (only when you use scalloped edge of lace on the side of your leg)

Cutting lace is always taking some time, because I want my bra's and panties to by symmetrical. Usually I cut all pieces for 1 bra and 2 panties at the same time to make sure I'm not falling short of fabric. All my pattern pieces have 1 cm seam allowance and seamlines clearly marked, certainly for the parts that must be cut from lace.

Step 1:
Lay the paper pattern piece on the lace. In this case the edge of the lace will be on the leg side, so it gets no seam allowance. I use the lowest part of the scallop as guideline.

In the picture, the corner with the red arrow will be the point where the lace will join the back part. I like it to be a low point of the scallop, so match the seamline exactly there.

Step 2
Remove the paper, and use the first part of your lace as guide for cutting the second part. Make sure you lay wrong sides together.







This is a detail of the 2 layers. The embroidery of the lace matches. The extra print on the fabric has no symmetry.











An example of the 2 layer, exactly matched.

















Example of all pieces for the panty, except crotch lining.