Modern Dressmaking Made Easy: Foundation Garments
For today's 14 days of lingerie post (tired yet?) I want to share a few marvelous pages from Mary Brooks Picken's 1938 book Modern Dressmaking Made Easy.
Now please keep in mind, this was written in 1938 by a woman of middling years who had lived through the late 1800s and who expressed the viewpoints of her generation. Please take the below with a grain of salt but enjoy the very useful information about properly fitting your foundation garments to your unique (and perfectly marvelous just as it is) figure.
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Consider your foundation garments before you start to take body measurements. It is known that women who are overweight wear too many foundation garments, and that small and slender women do not usually wear enough. Your body should look neither bound in nor floppy; it should look easy, free from bumps, and, above all, comfortable.
Women with firm breasts do not as a rule need a brassiere ("bra," "bandeau," or "uplift"), but wearing one is considered a protection against sagging breasts. Breasts that sag or droop, or those that have nursed babies, should be supported with a good garment that will hold them in place and prevent further sagging. An uplift of good design is also helpful for flat-chested figures, as it gives form and a desirable inconspicuous roundness.
Small and medium-small women can wear an uplift or brassiere and a step-in girdle or pantie and have a controlled yet lithesome figure. But, as soon as even slight overweight begins to show, you have the beginning of a problem.
Many corsetières feel that, for figures other than the very slender, a good corselet gives the best body line and equalizes proportions better than two garments. Some few feel that two well-supported garments, especially long-waisted brassieres are better than a corselet for the very large figure, because of the greater comfort (especially when sitting) and the better line that the two garments often make possible.
An able corset designer tells of working with one of her customers, a corset buyer. They asked a group of women to come to the store for foundation-garment criticism, promising that they would improve figures and give greater comfort as a result of their analysis of each figure. They found that only 3 out of the 108 women who came were perfectly corseted. Of the others, one-half wore garments too tight and supporters too short; the other half wore garments too loose and supporters too long. In 67 cases, the stays over the abdomen were too long; and 14 women had removed the stays for comfort. The corset clinic corrected 90 percent of the garment faults by fitting and adjusting.
Corset fabrics are washable, and new supporters are for sale at all notions departments, and with little effort and expense you can make great improvements for both line and comfort in garments you already have. Perhaps you can analyze your own problem and improve your silhouette even before you go to see the corset buyer or fitter. If the obvious errors have been corrected, more time can be devoted to the fine points, so that you will derive more benefit from the expert criticism.
Reputable corset companies carry from fifty to one hundred items in their lines, so that they have a correct garment for every type of figure. If you are not satisfied with your foundation garments, visit a good corset department at once. Talk with the corset buyer and have her experienced help in making your figure more pleasing. She knows all the corsets in several lines and should at once be able to show you types of garments that will give you the very best silhouette and at the same time the greatest comfort.
Physical examinations for school children show as many chronic disorders caused by bad posture as by malnutrition. Playgrounds and gymnasiums have done a great deal to correct and improve the posture and good health of children.
But even those adults who are careful to watch over and correct the bad habits of children sometimes grow careless about their own. In this connection, it is well to remember the old saying about the "severest critic and best friend." By being critical and constantly checking up on ourselves, we can be our own best friends if we correct our bad habits and establish good ones. Criticism without discipline accomplishes nothing.
It is easy to slip into careless habits, especially regarding foundation garments that we think no one sees but ourselves. In many cases illness causes women to lay aside their foundation garments and to delay putting them on again. During convalescence, they go about in negligee. Their bodies slump, and before they are fully recovered they have acquired a bad posture. Doctors say that carrying a baby before or after its birth often causes a woman to lose her spine, so to speak, and to drop into bad posture. This brings on nervousness and encourages other ills.
Sometimes an illness will leave nervous habits that must be recognized to be overcome when the illness has gone.
Wear your foundation garments as soon as you are up again after illness. They will help you to walk with balance. You will be light on your feet, your back will not tire, and you will look years younger. In avoiding the appearance of age, there is nothing so important as sustained posture, and that is encouraged by a good foundation garment.
Take Time to be properly fitted.
Modesty often keeps women from being properly fitted in foundation garments. Wear bloomers or panties when you go to be fitted, and try on garments in the price range you can afford until you have found a garment that really improves your body silhouette. Buy for line and comfort, and buy more often rather than put all your money for a year, let's say, into one expensive garment. Satin-and-lace garments are lovely, but you can get just as good lines in cotton foundation garments that have little or no trimming.
Many good firms make garments in less expensive fabrics, with the same cut and fit as their expensive models. Check this when buying, because often such fabrics are more sturdy and give good wear. Provide yourself with two outfits -one for everyday wear and one for wear under your best clothes. Remember that you are wearing foundation garments for two reasons: to give you a better silhouette, and to hold and thus keep beautiful your body lines. Improvement in figure comes with correct body control plus perfect body balance which, of course, you are now practicing continually.
You must always appear at ease in your clothes, and you cannot expect to do so if you wear foundation garments only when you are dressed up. Good habits are really great assets, and the habit of comfortable, good appearance is a most necessary one.
Foundation garments correctly designed and fitted are a great aid to posture. A good foundation garment on a growing girl can help her control her body lines and will assure their beauty when she matures."
Source: Modern Dressmaking Made Easy by Mary Brooks Picken, 1938.