Fitting: Adjusting the Watson Bra Pattern

As I mentionned in my previous post, I made 2 muslins of the Watson Bra last week. The first one, the suggested size based on my measurements, was way too small. For the second one I cut the size matching my RTW size. The band was good, but the cups were still not fitting right.

Today I took muslin #2 and tried it on again, this time with makeshift straps. It confirmed what I had noticed before: If I shifted the bra slightly to one side, the cup fit actually ok.

While wearing it, I had traced on the bra where the base of the cup should hit. So I took the cups out, and repositionned them slightly more apart (about 1cm -3/8" more towards the sides). It created a gap in the middle, but it actually worked!

To close the gap, all I had to do was add 1cm (3/8") to the inner side of the cup, tapering to nothing at the top.

As I was fitting my adjusted muslin, I also pinned out about 1cm of fabric at the cup seam, so I removed .6 cm (1/4") from the seam on both pieces. Since I removed the extra along the entire seam, I added it back to the outer sides so that the cup would still be the same width at the base and at the top.

Picture above: added .6 cm on outer side seam of piece A, and added a total of 1.5 cm (5/8") at the base of piece B, reduced to .6cm at the top.

On the cradle piece, I extended the curve width by about 1cm on the side, tapering to nothing at the notch. Since I'd moved the cup to the side, I adjusted the notch to match the cup seam.

My final adjustment was to add .6cm (1/4") to the band depth. I did this because the hook and eye piece that came as part of the kit are about 1cm (3/8") wider than the band (once allowances are folded). I figure with the elastic trim, it will fill the remaining .4cm difference.

After I made the changes to the pattern, I adjusted the cradle on muslin #2 to match my new pattern piece, and recut new cups.

So this is muslin 2 1/2, which fits pretty darn good!

That's it for my adjustements! I was quite please that the alterations turned out to be pretty simple. In hindsight, I probably could have just added the extra width on the outer side of the cups, rather than the middle, but it seems like the seam is hitting in the right place, so in the end it probably doesn't matter. Can't wait to get the final version done!