Patternmaking for Underwear Design: Volume 1 Paperback – 1 April 2010

Great book very helpful

A simple to understand book that gives loads of detail on how to construct underwear. Great for ideas and different construction options

Lingerie is notoriously difficult to fit properly, and sewing lingerie with commercial patterns is really no different than trying to achieve a perfect fit with purchased lingerie. So it's refreshing to find a book that takes lingerie drafting seriously!The biggest difference I've seen here in that these bra drafts all start with the underwire shape, and build from there. Every other bra draft I've seen starts with a bodice sloper, which is then adapted into a bra shape. The approach taken here makes a lot more sense to me for getting an accurate fit. There are instructions here for drafting a full brand bra, partial band bra, sports bra, and a few cup seam variations. There are also drafting instructions for a teeshirt, leggings, boy short panties, G-string, and brief panties. You can then mix and match these drafts to create a bodysuit, camisole, and even an old-school button-down pyjama set!Contrary to some other reviews here, this book can be used to draft bras in ANY size - the measurements for 34B are simply used as an example! You just substitute your own in to draft it for yourself. This is fairly common in pattern drafting books so I'm not sure why others were confused.So far I've only drafted the teeshirt and leggings sloper for myself, but I prefer both of these to the equivalent drafts in " Metric Pattern Cutting for Women's Wear " by Winifred Aldritch. These are drafted with 10% negative ease which gives a closer fit. As someone who makes a lot of activewear, I've found these to be closer in fit to the RTW I buy. I've found these drafting instructions to be straightfrward to understand, and the diagrams indicating preferred seam allowances of the finished pieces are also appreciated.All in all, it's an excellent book on pattern drafting for a wide range of lingerie, and is a great starting point for getting that elusive perfect fit. The book does not contain construction instructions, nor advice on altering patterns for fit, so you'll need to get such information elsewhere.

Given other quite favourable reviews on Amazon, I am REALLY disappointed with this book. I preface my commentary with a note that I am a trained corsetiere - I make corsets, and bought this book with the aim to start testing, fitting and producing bras and other lingerie items as well to a variety of sizes.Each pattern is constructed to the size 34B, using measurements from this size only. Keeping the patterns to one size is a fairly standard thing in flat-pattern books... but the only other size-specific measurements given within the book are 34A, 34C and 34D. Another reviewer mentioned that you can simply use your own measurements in the patterns. However, the pattern instructions are written in such a way as this is not at all a simple process; I am not a newbie to pattern making and I cannot work out where the author gets her numbers from, as no chart of bra construction measurements is given and none of the instructions make it clear where the measurements are from exactly! An instruction, for example, to 'mark 15-16cm from the centre front as the cradle width' is all well and good if you are content to make only 34B's, but what is this measurement if I'm making, for example, a 40D? or a 30C? 'Use your own measurements' is easy enough to say, but how, when the book does not explain where the measurements came from?A chart of standard measurements for a range of sizes or information on how to grade patterns would have been helpful, and was in fact what I was hoping for in a book that claims to be a 'comprehensive patternmaking guide'.Also, I was horrified to realise the information for what size bra to even wear that the book gives is FLAT OUT WRONG. It states "A woman with a 29-30 inch under bust girth is recommended to wear a bra with a 34 inch band" - no no no no!!! Your underbust measurement *IS* your band size - I have a 32 inch underbust measurement, I wear a 32 band bra. Adding 4-5 inches to your underbust measurement is a sure-fire guarantee to wearing the incorrect size bra; you do not need an extra four inches in a garment that is meant to fit *tightly*Very disappointed, as otherwise there's a great range of patterns for different pieces of underwear, but the vague instructions and lack of measurement charts mean that this book is not at all useful for someone like me, who wants to make garments of all sizes. Will likely be returning.

I'm quite disappointed with this book. I haven't tried the bras yet, but for the panties and all-in-ones, I found the directions very hit and miss especially for custom drafting. For instance, the body shaper gives the rear gusset depth as a fixed measurement, but the same part on the brief style panties is relative (ie ¼ waist- hip), and there's no explanation of why they are different. I assume the fixed measurement is a typo that related to the example size 10, but there is no way of knowing. The directions can also be hard to read as the keys aren't always clear, and the instructions are pretty minimal. It certainly isn't a substitute for Ann Haggar's book, nor necessarily the best place for beginners or home sewers to start, but I can see that it would be a supplement for more advanced pattern making.

Very usefull guide to pattern cutting for underware design with easy to follow diagrams and a broad range of styles are explored. By far the best book Ive come across although measurements and instructions can be tricky with all patterns designed to fit a 34B, meaning the measurements can be tricky to use if you make anything bigger or smaller. Apart from this, a very good book.

Horrible. I traded it in for a different book.

Easily understood drafting directions and clear diagrams for bras using underwires as a base. Great variety of garments, with information and explanations of what, why, and where....

i bought this book to learn the bra pattern ,but there is no proper guide line to make the pattern, all patterns depends on under wire shape and size,

Le spiegazioni sono molto chiare ed esaustive. Buon testo ma non merita 5 stelle prima di tutto perché presenta molte tipologie di indumento intimo, forse perfino troppe, perché alcuni dettagli sono appena accennati mentre meriterebbero uno spazio maggiore.Il difetto più grosso è che i modelli vengono sviluppati esclusivamente nella taglia di riferimento. Non si spiega né lo sviluppo di modelli su misura né lo sviluppo delle taglie, per cui è necessario avere altre conoscenze di modellistica e sviluppo taglie per poter modificare i modelli.

Was soll ich sagen .... es ist wirklich ein sehr gutes Buch ... ich kann es nur weiterempfehlen!Es ist leicht verständlich, auch wenn man jetzt nicht unbedingt gut Englisch kann versteht man durch die gute Bebilderung eigentlich echt alles was das Schnitte anfertigen angeht. Am Anfang bekommt man wirklich viele und sehr gute Infos über Unterwäsche im allgemeinen, auf was zu achten ist, weshalb man dies und das macht, was brauche ich zum Nähen usw.Es wird nicht lange um etwas kompliziert herum geredet wie es in den deutschen Büchern leider immer der Fall ist (da tu ich mich als gelernte und lange Zeit in diesem Beruf tätige Kraft schon manchmal schwer) sondern man kommt sofort auf den Punkt und erklärt wieso und weshalb!!! Ich würde dieses Buch auch jederzeit einem Laien empfehlen der sich für das Anfertigen bzw Erstellen seiner eigenen Unterwäsche interessiert (nur sollte man dann schon einigermaßen Englisch und nähen können)Ich muss auch dazu sagen, dass ich echt viele viele Schnittbücher gekauft und wieder verkauft habe und es nur wenige gibt bei denen ich sagen kann die sind sooooo gut die behalte ich .... dieses Buch besitze ich noch immer :) Die "paar" Euro sind das Buch bei weitem Wert .... hier können sich mal gewisse deutsche "Systeme" um keine Namen zu nennen eine Scheibe von abschneiden. Schnitte konstruieren ist kein Hexenwerk auch wenn es einem in Deutschland immer so verkauft wird!!!

I bought this book for the bra making pattern which was difficult to work with at best. She uses a standard 34b bra size to do the cup and the band. I was not sure how to get the band to my size except to add to it in the back. This book shows a fairly good dart manipulation example but failed to give thorough direction for the entire process to help with the design changes in making bras and designing my own patterns. The book does show how to make a sloper for most patterns. I enjoyed the way this book is layed out but she doesn't state some things that one must wonder about to figure out how to use what she has written.I used an internet site called Patternschool.com in which the owner has a full two pages dedicated to both the bra band and the bra cup patternmaking process.I have never seen such a maze of difficulty in the way information is put together in the bra making process. I bought this book after I bought the Bra-Making Manual which is a great book for making bra patterns and doing different designs but the copyright listed doesn't allow one to use her information for any purpose other than making one your own bra. Kristina Chin does allow her work to be used (not copied but used) for education purposes. Her work along with Stuart's who is author of the Patternschool web site has helped me learn the pattern making process for bras.There is a lot more in the book besides bra pattern making but that so far is all I can really review. I think I could use this book for the block patterns. She does have a full sizing list for all sizes based on existing measurments in the garment making business.The book appears complete and does seem to offer most of what the author claims to teach.