The Refashioners 2018 - Inspired By Part 2

As I alluded to in my last post I have made a second entry into the The Refashioners - Inspired By contest .  Whilst browsing through the local thrift shop I found this beautiful purple plaid shirt.

If it had been just a smidge larger I could have worn it as is, but unfortunately no - or maybe fortunately because I love this shirts second lease on life.

Once I ruled out using the purple plaid with the green plaid in my previous refashion (I still think that could have been a great pairing)  I knew that I wanted to use this fabric to make myself a new bra.   Something like this!

Inspiration photo

But I wanted to make it 100% out of upcycled clothes.  To that end I needed a some bras to cannibilise.

Luckily I have lots of those.

This old sports bra had been consigned to the recycle bin as it didn't provide anywhere near enough support for actual exercise and it would never get worn day to day is it gives me a serious monoboob.  So I took it apart and reused the black elastic around the bottom and the hook and eyes.

This is a totally unworn bra - I bought it cheap but it just didn't fit so never got worn. I've used bits and pieces of it before.  For this project I used the underwire channeling, the pink lace off the cups, the power mesh from the back band and the pink elastic  from the sides, plus the little bow.

Finally an old swimsuit bottom.  I bought this because I loved the fabric at the front, but the bottoms were always too big and the tops too small so I never got to wear them.  I finally decided I never will, so I  used the plain white spandex from the back of the bottoms to make the back band portion of the bra.

I also had to use another hook and eye from my stash taken off old bras as two hooks (from the first bra) doesn't provide enough support for me.  I prefer 3 but since they are hard to come by in cheap bras I usually just use two twos together.

I used the same pattern that I've been working on here, lining the cups with the purple plaid as well.  I didn't bother with underwires as they just aren't comfortable.  The straps have no elastic in them as I find that this makes them more supportive.  I did however use a small piece on interfacing in the straps to give them more structure - the only new materials in the whole thing.

Once the bra was made I knew I wanted to make a matching set of undies.  I wasn't quite sure how the non stretch flannel would work for undies, but it turns out they're surprisingly comfortable.

I had to add in extra panels in the side to account for the lack of stretch - and added some length to the pattern for the same reason.  As I was working from scraps I needed to put a seam down the center of the entire thing.  I used some more of the white spandex from the bikini bottoms to line the crotch but I didn't have enough reclaimed elastic so all the elastic and the black knit fabric used for the waist and leg bands are from stash.

 I'm really quite happy with my new bra and pants set.  Probably not something to wear in the middle of summer but I'm looking forward to wearing them through winter!.