Bras are awful. If you’ve ever thought us less endowed individuals have it easier- no, we don’t. Prettier? In terms of fabric appearance, yes. In terms of fitting? No. Still stuck with whatever shape is in fashion and this tends to be for years. But also most bras overly rely on the heavy duty but very narrow elastic that make the straps but also across the back at the edges of the band. All that happens as you go down sizes is the elastic also gets narrower. They remain as rigid and dig in as badly.

Bras could be built the way I wind up customising them. I buy bras for the cup size. I then completely remove the band and make a pattern from it and cut out the same shape in two layers of matching spandex/lycra and overlock/serge them together and reinstall. So far I haven’t had to replace the straps as they tend to have much more room to be made looser.

You can use a firmer fabric and just extend the middle a bit if you have a greater need for support but it’s so much easier to wear.

I wish cups were taller at the sides as that would also allow the band to be wider and so be more supportive without relying on those inappropriate elastics.

One of the things people get surprised about in historic costuming is how tall the sides of bodices go, right up to the armpit. But it’s the same principle. We lost the ability of bodices to be self supporting as we cut into the fabric that does the supporting.

I’ve been meaning to post about this for years. Wanting to get a better range of options. But it really does some down to those two issues. An over reliance on terrible narrow and inflexible elastic and cups that are cut down too far at the sides limiting the ability to make the band wider. The wide the band the more the pressure is eased away.