I know it has been a while since I’ve released a truly creative pattern, as I have been mainly focusing on the pattern making and understanding how to really customize a pattern to fit.

The Ariel Bra Cup is my creative outlet. While this started as a pattern making project, I truly have found the construction options for this bra to be fun. In the video tutorial series, I use a sheer bra tulle for the cups and the band. I sew the cups inside out and cover the seams on the outside with a stretch velvet ribbon.

This was really a fun project and a nice break from my daily pandemic routine. Emily started school this week virtually so it has allowed me to get some work done. Yay. Not sure how long this will last, but I’m thrilled that is has.

Here are a couple photos of the bra in detail.

Enjoy watching the videos and make sure to tag me with your makes on Instagram with @porcelynnesupplies.

Get your own Ariel Bra Cup Pattern or Eve Classic Demi Bra Band.

This pattern has been a labor of love. I have had to go back to this pattern about 4 times, each time approaching the grade differently. But I am confident that these cups work well now. I have created 4 different torso shapes each in 36 different sizes. One download gets you everything.

I have only been able to verify that the Ivy works well with the regular wire. I have been unsuccessful in testing the Ivy for vertical wires, although I do have the entire range graded and ready to test, but no one has committed to it. If you are interested in participating in the test, please join my pattern testing group on Facebook. I do offer compensation in the form of a gift certificate to my shop.

Well, back to the Ivy. I wanted to create a 1 piece cup that can be used with the Eve. This would be ideal as a swim top, or a lacy addition to any neckline.

This is a project I’ve been working on since around March. These patterns were being developed during the development of the third edition of Bare Essentials: Bras. The Eve Classic for Regular wires are designed for symmetrical shaped breasts up to about a G cup. For individuals who are more omega shaped, I recommend waiting until the vertical wired cups are available. Here are the links for the Eve Bra Band Pattern and Eve Bra Cup Pattern.

I wanted to create something to shake up the bra making world and I think this was a success. I wanted the ability for someone to make their bra based on their wire size and not the traditional A, B, C cup sizing.

After many tests, I came up with this sizing system. The cups are available in 20 sizes – 1 through 20. I did this to stop people from buying and making their “normal” bra size. The size selection is a little more complicated. It is based on the drafting method I created, so its mathematical based in nature, but don’t worry, I don’t make you do the math. I don’t even tell you how to do it. All you have to do is plug in your measurements into the band and cup calculators and voila, your recommended size is calculated.

The great thing about this, is that the cups and bands are modular and are sold separately. You select you band size based on your measurements, then you select the band by your wire size. For the cups, you buy the cups based on your wire size. The awesome thing is that every wire size set has between 9 and 14 cup sizes to make it easy to go up or down a size without having to modify anything else in the pattern.

Like I said, I like to shake things up and change the way people think. I recommend making a fitting band to test the band and wire fit first, then once you have determined that works, you then test the cup. This is an example of a test fit with the Eve using a suspender clip for the cup.

I created a full set of tutorial videos for the Eve on YouTube, including how to make a fitting band, so be sure to check those out too.

Here is a little food for thought, if you like the fit of the Eve, there is nothing to keep you from taking the Eve and turning it into a sloper to then manipulated per the sloper instruction in the book or online course. Think of this as a cheat way into drafting without doing the basic drafting.

I have created a single reference page that includes the calculators, the instructions and all the videos. Here is that page: Eve Classic Bra Pattern Tutorials

Happy New Year to all. I have been busy, as always, working on new and exciting things. This new sports bra pattern is no exception. I made a new style with a few new features.

The Laurel Sports Bra is no different in fit than the Christina, in fact you can interchange the pattern pieces of the Laurel with the Christina, meaning you can use the back of one with the front of the other, or switch up the waistbands.

I made a couple small adjustments to the Christina waistline, so if you previously purchased this, just log into your account and redownload the pattern to get the pattern updates. These will be needed if you plan to interchange the pattern parts.

The Laurel Sports Bra features a fun criss-cross detail at the front waistband. The waistline of the sports bra is contoured up at the center front to better hold the breasts in place, plus it is helpful if you have issues with rib cage restriction.

I suffer from acid reflux, so tight waistbands under the bust are very uncomfortable for me. The waistband isn’t supposed to fit tight, so it lends itself comfort for people like me. The support is all in the body of the bra. The shaping of the princess seams gives you a little lift which is also helpful if your bust is completely deflated such as mine.

I am my own fit model, a 36J-38J depending on the holidays, so the sports bra was designed for supporting those large cups.

The back features a hook and eye closure with a heart shaped cut out in the back. The back is also scoop-necked and can have adjustable straps. The adjustable strap and hook and eye was added to this design by request. The instructions state how to remove the hook and eye portion and turn back into a straight band, but if you have the Christina, you can use the Christina back band as well.

The pattern for the straps have a fixed length marking on them, so the adjustable part is also optional.

As for the pattern itself, I have made some fun new changes to the download and options for a printed pattern. My range is extended up to an N cup now! As if I didn’t have enough sizes already! One of the girls that has been a big supporter of my business became an N cup and I wanted to make sure she was covered. This range is for you Ivy!

The patterns are now available in 4 paper sizes – Letter, A4, A1 (23×33) and A0 (33×46). Now it is easy to print in nearly any format. I also created layers on the pdfs, so you can turn off sizes you don’t want to print out and print just the pages that have your size on them.

I also have a printed pattern option for the Laurel and the Christina. I went back and updated the Christina pattern to have all the same features including adding metric measurements to the directions of both patterns. The Christina Sports Bra also has a new expanded range up to an N! I had to increase the price by a few bucks, but for all the hard work I did on these, I felt this was ok.

As a little thank you to all my fans, customers and friends, I am making all my other downloads and corresponding kits 25% off for the release of the Laurel Sports Bra. This discount is good until Sunday the 13th of January.

I created 4 new kits for the Laurel Sports Bra and even added a few more sizes of kits for the Christina. If you purchase one of the Christina kits for the Laurel, you will also need the Laurel Add-on kit. This is the difference in supplies that are needed for the Laurel.

Here are a few samples from some of my testers. They fit great. The white one is made of all cotton jersey (t-shirt fabric), so the pattern works for nearly any fabric. I picked a couple different angles so you can see all the different details. The green one is made of swim lycra and the others are made of scuba.

I did a series of YouTube videos just as all the other patterns. I will be releasing all of them over the next week, so they won’t all be available until next weekend. I need to do this with YouTube due to their algorithms.  Here is the first video. I will create another blog post next weekend that contain links to all the videos.

Until then, happy sewing and thanks for following.

I technically released this pattern when I released the Little Rachel Tank, but I wanted to make a separate post about the Little Rachel Brief after the videos were released.

I designed both the Little Rachels to be like the women’s patterns. The main difference with the brief is the height of the brief. My daughter didn’t like it coming up so high, so I hacked off an inch and a half on the final pattern.

These videos are less about how to make them and more about how to teach a 5 year old to make her own bathing suit.

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My daughter is such a spunky little girl. She wants to be just like her mama. She comes home from school and has to “do orders.” This involves putting random stuff into bags with my order buckets.

Then she has to do work of cutting out “patterns” with her fabric scraps. This involves taking pattern pieces from the recycling bin, cutting on the edges of whichever pattern she gets her hands on and cuts the shape out of scraps. Occasionally she will sew the pieces together randomly.

I admire her drive. Although right now, she won’t let me write. I keep telling her I need 15 minutes to write so we can go swimming. She has interrupted me about 16 times in the last minute. We will see if I actually get this done to go swimming.

Because she wants to be like me, she wants to make things for herself that look like the things I make for myself. This is the first official pattern release of the girl’s sized version of something I made for adults. The Little Rachel Tank Top. I made it available in only 3 sizes – small, medium and large. I figure over the large, girls can wear the adult sized Rachel Tank Top.

We bonded over cutting the pattern out and I walked her through sewing the seams of the tank top. She was partially involved in the rest of the construction, but the videos show proof of her work.

I am trying something new. I will be releasing each pattern part a day apart from each other. I will update this post with each of the videos when they go live.

We decided to experiment with making a swimsuit out of the Little Rachel Set. I am so tired of those kid’s bathing suits just not fitting. The tops ride up on her in her size, but if we go up a size for the set, the bottoms fall off of her and the top still rides up. This tank was designed to be wider at the butt and belly, because frankly, not all kids are tube shaped, like the industry dictates.

This bathing suit is now officially her favorite item of clothing. I have actually released both the top and bottom on my website, but the videos for the bottom will not be released for a few weeks. I need to space them out a bit. I will make another announcement when the bottom is officially released.

In addition to completing these videos, I am changing how I am providing my pattern for download. This pattern and the brief contains four files each: the instructions, letter size, A4 and A1 for large format. I have also redesigned the patterns to be edge to edge with a 3/4″ overlap so those who hate trimming, don’t have to anymore.

I am also adding the option to have a paper copy of the patterns mailed. I will be working on updating the Christina Sports Bra and the Adult Rachel Tank and Brief to be provided in a similar manner. The Christina will be last as there are 143 sizes to update and that isn’t on my priority list right now.

Enjoy and subscribe to my channel or this blog to be notified of new videos.

New pattern and videos! Introducing the Rachel Brief.

I designed the Rachel Brief as a panty to go with the Rachel Tank. I created three different kits for the brief. The Rachel Brief is a high waisted panty with a contrast panel on the front and comes in sizes from XS through 3X. I also did a kids version, but that isn’t live on my website yet. I’ll make sure to announce that when it is. I filmed sewing videos of those with my daughter, but I’m not sure how they will turn out. Stay tuned for those.

Below are the videos for the Rachel Brief. Leave me a comment or feedback on them.

In other news, my daughter started Kindergarten yesterday. She is getting so big so fast. She started a public Montessori program. The school is about 5 times larger than the school she previously went to, so I’m a little discombobulated about it.

Here she is pretending to be a chipmunk with food in her cheeks. She is just so darn cute. 

Here in Florida they changed how our schools work in regards to campus safety. We have armed safety officers on campus now and all visitors must be chaperoned around school. I do admit having a gun on campus makes me nervous. I believe they start the run and hide gun drills next week. When I was in grade school all we had were tornado drills, which I remember scared the crap out of me. Who knows how the kids will respond to the gun drills. I fear it will cause nightmares.

This is an interesting world we are living in now. I think home school is on the agenda for middle and high school.

I didn’t anticipate releasing these videos and kits for the Rachel Lace-Up Tank today. I was planning to release the $50 gift certificate contest. I changed my mind. I will be shooting a video in the next few days and the gift certificate contest will be made live shortly after.

The Rachel Tank is available in 30 sizes total, from XS to a 3X. Each size has 5 different bust size patterns. I wanted to do something sweet and sexy in the way of a tank. But I also wanted the tank to be versatile to be used as an athletic top. I made a very small set of kits for this design.

If there is interest, I have a few other fabrics I could make additional kits with. This includes everything you need to make one tank. Here are the links below. Stay tuned for the matching brief to be released in a few weeks.

I have been working hard on patterns to fit a variety of body shapes & sizes and this pattern is no exception. I created a basic range of XS to 3X, but I added five bust size variations for each size. That means there is a total of 30 sizes all together.

This tank can be made as an active wear garment or lingerie garment. I completed my first set of videos for the athletic active wear top. The sample was made with an accent print made by my friend Erin Mason. Her amazing prints are available on Spoonflower.

I did not have a lot of fabric to make kits, but I was able to make two small kits and one medium kit from the fabric I have. I hope you enjoy the pattern and the videos.

Stay tuned for a variation of this tank’s construction with a lace up style. The videos and kits will be available in about two weeks. Make sure to subscribe to my blog of YouTube channel to find out when new patterns are released.

It is official. The Christina Sports Bra is finalized, updated and officially available. I made a few minor changes this past week after sewing up several samples in various sizes. They were minor changes affecting only the waistband and the printing.

Here is a little show and tell of last week’s samples.

My most recent sample, and also the subject of my main video, was completed out of scuba fabric. It is by far the best supporting sports bra I own that actually fits me. I should be able to do anything my personal trainer asks of me.

What is Scuba Fabric
To explain scuba fabric, is to understand it is not actually fabric used for scuba. Its not even for swim wear. Not sure where it got its name, but I assume it was someone trying to reinvent the wheel. To describe it bluntly, it is virtually the same fabric I remember all my grandmother’s clothes being made out of.

It is a double knitted polyester fabric that is restricted in stretch. I think there is about 2-4% Lycra in it. It is relatively low priced, although with the new trend of using it in athletic wear, I foresee the price shooting up. For those who have really inexpensive thrift stores nearby, I can see re-purposing old granny pants into some sports bras.

Its Video Time!

After my husband watched a few videos I had previously made, he decided to intervene and help me out. He used to be a cinematographer back in LA, so it only seems natural that he’d help me. Not sure why it took him a year and a half to jump in. He is now directing my videos and editing. I still have a few videos I had previously filmed, but he will be doing the editing and we may have to re-shoot some of the footage.

We are hoping this is a slightly more professional look to my YouTube content.

The Kits are Coming! The Kits are Coming!

I have a variety of fabrics I bought to make kits for this pattern. I’m primarily waiting on my powermesh so I can make them live. The mesh will arrive in about 3-4 weeks, so as soon as they are available, I will make the blog announcement. Make sure to subscribe to the blog to find out first. I only bought about 5 yards of each fabric, so I can only realistically get about 10 kits out of each fabric. That makes them exclusive and in short supply.