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The bra Wired, padded, itchy (and occasionally comfortable) Tuesday, September 25, 2001 By Mackenzie Carpenter, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Uncomfortable bras are a relatively new phenomenon in human history. The first one didn't even appear a little over a century ago.
"Bras in themselves are not a bad thing. They were probably a very good thing in that they moved us away from corsets that were based on the principle of very tight boning around the entire rib cage," said Marilyn Yalom, author of "The History of the Breast."
The corset had survived since the Middle Ages despite periodic campaigns against them by doctors, philosophers and economists like Thorstein Veblen, who claimed they made women weak and unfit for work and increasingly dependent on their husbands.
The first patented "soutien-gorge" --literally "throat support" -- was advertised by a French department store in 1899. In 1907, a New York debutante named Mary Phelps Jacobs had constructed her own version of a brassiere before a dance, of two handkerchiefs and pink ribbon. She made a few copies for her friends, and then patented the design in 1914 before selling the rights to the Warner Brothers Corset Co. for $15 million.
Her first brassieres, in fact, were diaphanous things, offering little support, which fit with the post-World War I fashion for flappers with flat chests..
That changed in the mid-1920s when two young women partners in a New York dress firm began building undergarments into their clothes that emphasized "the more natural contours of the bust," prompting a demand for separate brassieres. Finally, they filed a patent in 1926 for a brassiere "to support the bust in a natural position," and started the Maiden Form Brassiere Co.
After World War II, breast size jumped up again,as the "torpedo" bra became popular -- Maiden Form's circle-stitched Chansonette, for example, was dubbed the "bullet bra."
In the 1960s and 70s, the breast silhouette shrunk once more as the androgynous look became fashionable and feminists began complaining that manufacturers were designing bras for men's rather than women's needs. Manufacturers responded again with the "Invisible" bra and the "No-bra Bra" -- but by the mid-to-late 1980s, large breasts were back in style again, with Victoria's Secret and the "Wonder-Bra" doing boom business.
More recently, bra manufacturers seem to be sensing that comfort, rather than itchy lace, sells. They've been adjusting their marketing strategies accordingly, as evidenced by a recent online survey from the makers of the "Barely There" bra.
"Having a Bad Day? Feel Free to Blame It on Your Bra," the company's press release exclaims.
And in what is sure to strike terror in the hearts of the folks at Victoria's Secret, the survey reported that "75 percent of women said they were willing to compromise style [their italics] to find a bra that is supportive and makes them feel good."
Not to be outdone, a Harris survey commissioned by Playtex polled more than 1,000 women nationwide about bras and found that 85 percent want a "shape-enhancing bra that feels like nothing at all."
On the all-too-critical underwire question, it was Bush vs. Gore all over again, with 49 percent preferring underwire and 49 percent no underwire. And in what was no doubt a relief to Playtex, 67 percent said they preferred to wear a bra to going braless.
"What we hear from women is they want lift, they want a great profile. They don't necessarily want cleavage, they want to be smooth, sleek with no puckers or bulges," said Lisa Boecker, the marketing manager for Barely There.
"Women do not have to suffer any more, with the new technologies that are out there. You don't have to have those ridges in your shoulders, if you get the right fitting."
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