its sew suezyque: The Maya Bra

Saturday, February 6, 2016

The Maya Bra

Whew! It's been awhile. All those good intentions I had at the beginning of 2015 were derailed by a health issue that zapped all my physical and mental energy. So I am rolling them over to 2016 - reduce, reuse, recycle, hehehe.

I actually finished the Maya bra in January. It's a new to me pattern and it's free! A very nice pattern that goes together well. The only issue I ran into was in the way the sizing is chosen. You measure for your band size and then you use your wire size to determine the cup size. I am evidently one of those people whose breast base is wider than my actual cup size. Which would explain a lot of my trouble in RTW even though I am not that odd a size. I settled on size 85E.

She is made from some left over ITY and a sheer non-stretch lining for the cups and the bridge. I added some straps that I saw on Beverly Johnson's Designer Bra class on Craftsy. They are also ITY and I interfaced with a lightweight fusible to remove the stretch. Black powernet for the back. I also modified the back for a leotard back instead of the straight one that was drafted.

I made her without the cut and sew foam, mostly just to see if I could and how it would work. I think it worked pretty well. So far this has been one of the most comfortable bras I have worn. I am still trying to decide if I prefer the foam or not, but in the meantime you can't have too many bras in the lingerie drawer, right?

I enclosed all the interior seams in a method similar to this one. And I wish I was organized enough to tell where all the notions, elastics, etc. came from but they have been accumulating in my stash for a while and I really don't have a clue about most of it.

Sorry, not brave enough to post pictures of me wearing the Maya, but I do really like the nice round shape she gives. The girls are well supported and hoisted front & center.

And while I was at it, I made a fitting band, she's not neat or pretty, but she sure has been helpful. And I wish I could claim credit for the idea, but I read about it here. I modified it a little, but it is the same basic idea.