Part Two - Front & Back Waist Issues

The waist line is one of the trickiest areas to work with in larger sizes. In most cases we're not talking about a simple scaled up body type, we're really dealing with minimising the appearance of a weight issue. No doubt most of you are familiar with what looks best as far as styles go (eg; avoiding horizontal stripes, etc), but we're talking pattern making. As such there are only two things we can do. We can minimise the issue by not drawing attention to it and/or we can actually change the shape a small amount.

Changing tummy and waist shape is usually done by use of stiffer fabrics or linings. Obviously the less stretch left in the fabric the less negative ease you can use, so there is a trade off between being squeezed flatter and actually being able to put on the garment. Sounds simple doesn't it? Just add in some more ease and stiffen the fabric even more? Wrong, there is a catch.

I'm sure almost everyone who's ever tried to buy a size 16+ swimsuit has encountered this wonderful fabric called Powernet. It's a type of netted lining that while having rebound tension, doesn't really stretch that much ... think of it as a very heavy weight low stretch liner. It's the praise of all because it sits very flat on the body, hiding all sorts of nasty lumps, bumps and rolls. The problem with it however is that the garment looks odd when on the body (all be it flatter looking) and no one seems to have worked out why. It has this uncanny ability to draw your eye right to the very area you're trying to cover. Why?

Let me begin the answer by pointing out that very few designers and pattern makers ever see the big picture. Right now I'm poking my tongue out at professional designers and you're about to find out what you've all messed up all this time. To make it worse for you, know that a 16 year old, first year fashion student was actually the first person to give me the correct reason. You see, the waist encircles the body, but powernet never seems to. What this means is you have a stiff front section that doesn't stretch much with a soft, and often unlined, back section which stretches an awful lot. So rather than pull the tummy in, it still sticks out (even though it looks flat) because the back panel is giving way in order to even out the tension all the way around the circle. But what is it that looks wrong, besides the stretched fabric print of the back compared to the front? Remember my 16 year old student? Well she spotted that the side seam had moved forward toward the tummy while at the arm hole it was still centered perfectly at the side. And while you don't notice this unless it's brought to your attention, subconsciously you know it's not right and you look closer at the area to work out why. Fact!

There is also another problem with varying fabric types and linings in the same garment. Because they each have differing rebound tensions they move differently. Sometimes this is desired, sometimes this is terrible. Powernet slows things from moving so when you sit down and increase the length from center back waist to crotch that length has to come from somewhere or the garment gets eaten by ones bottom ... usually the garment rides inwards from the outer cheeks first and then gets eaten. Many designers don't line the back to allow it to stretch more because of this but then they just exaggerate the first problem. The trick is to balance the tensions correctly.

So how do we balance the tensions when deciding where to place side seams (or working with different tensions anywhere else for that matter). Simple! Let's say you want to line the front with Powernet and the back with normal swimwear lining. Cut yourself a strip of fabric about a meter long and 10cm wide. Sew liner to one half and powenet to the other and then stretch it. Lets say, you stretch the whole strip to 130cm. Measure the length of the swimwear lining half (should be around 75cm depending on the liner quality) and the Powernet half (around 55cm) and you'll soon see that the Powernet lining gives up 55:75 of the stretch of standard swimwear lining. This means if you are using 12% negative ease normally, you need to lessen the negative ease of the section lined with Powernet to 8.8% (12% x 55/75) ... or essentially you're moving the side seams backward 1.5cm each side on for a 100cm hip measurement. This needs to be done for the whole area lined with Powernet. That's quite a visual difference even if it doesn't seem like it at first. In this way the seams will all sit where you want them to sit and the garment also moves more predictably!

The above balances tensions correctly, but what if you want even more tummy control? Well really you're only option is to use support netting, like powernet, all the way around the back ... think of it as a stretchy corset. Of course you still need to let out the negative ease in both front and now back panels to 8.8% (in the above example) so it still matches the tenision in the top of the garment correctly. About the only other thing to consider is that you cannot do this with a design that drops below the waist at the back (or even a few centimeters above it) or the garment will simply gape open and all your efforts may be lost. Support netting requires full circumferential covering to be effective! Also remember that the garment will be stiffer and more difficult to get into even though it's actually a little larger in the tummy section. The image below shows how I'd modify the pattern (not the block) for use with full wrap round Powernet ...

The red shaded area represents the tummy we're trying to control or flatten. You'll note that the tummy area is below the leg line at the side seam on a standard block so I've chosen firstly to use a squarer leg line which is consistent with the style larger sizes prefer and require. The dashed red line represents the limit of the support netting (I don't like to use netting in the crotch because it tends to rise). The blocks on the right show how I've reduced the horizontal negative ease to 8.8% across the whole bottom half of the blocks and then blended it in to the side seam above the tummy area. I've also squared off the side seam a fraction at the leg line, to correct the leg line curve, rather than adjust the leg line itself.

Ok, moving on ... so now you're aware that side seam position can affect the appearance of a garment at the waist and hips. But where should it sit for optimal aesthetics? Optimal is how the human eye expects to see things in nature because in nature everything is balanced. If you're carrying a heavy box in front of your body you will lean backward to balance. If you could defy gravity for a moment and not lean backward then everyone would look at you strangely. Have you ever noticed how actors lifting painted polystyrene rocks in old movies always look ridiculous when they throw them?

Well that heavy box is much like carrying weight on your tummy. Pregnant women, for example, lean much further back. Straightening the side seam to make it look like you're standing square looks as odd as the actor with the rock. But it's not just the tummy we need to consider. With respect to waist we are also interested in sway and, on some people, a pad of fat that sits just on and below the back waist (hereinafter referred to politely as fuller lower back). Take a look at the illustration below. The top picture shows the side profile of the stereotypical figure.

If we are to divide the hip measurement in two when making the blocks, the side seam sits exactly half way on either side ... but if the majority of the measurement is in the front, then the side seam will appear more forward. Now a certain amount of forward is needed because straight obviously looks wrong, but too far forward looks obvious as well. The correct position is somewhere in between ... ie; the design 'accepts' the person is carrying weight on the tummy by allowing the seam to move forward, but not so much so that the concept of how much weight is accurately realised by the viewer ... it's a fine line. I tend to draw the side seam (sometimes even literally) on the body as you see on the images above ... what looks right to the eye. Then I measure how much is in front and how much is in the back ... let's say my client, who has a waist of 78cm, has 43cm in front and 35cm in the back. Now if we had left the seam at the halfway point of 39cm you can see that it would have been way too forward.

There is the argument that if you put the side seam exactly at visual optimum as shown on the illustrations then you are trying too hard to hide something and people will again notice. I don't necessarily subscribe to this as I did place the seam at what I considered to be aesthetic to me. This arguement suggests that you bring the seam back to somewhere between optimum (43cm) and halfway (39cm) so that the human brain recognises that the extra 'weight' is fairly represented by a certain amount of 'distortion'. Personally I think I'm already doing this when I draw the line on the body so to do it again would just be silly ... but you can make up your own mind by drawing the optimum and the halfway lines on the body and then having a good look as you move around the body.

Ok so we know we might need to move the side seam backward or forward, but what about sway? How does that affect the pattern? Sway is two things. It's firstly the natural curvature of the spine (which varies from person to person) and secondly it's a result of arching back to carry extra weight (think pregnancy for example). Now because the spine is at the back of the body, no matter how much you arch, the length of the back doesn't change significantly ... but the length of the front does. If you've made a one piece block according to the instructions you will already accounted for most of this, but it might serve benefit to tweak a little extra length in to the front block at the waist line. How much? If you consider that this will mostly be required in conjunction with moving the side seam backwards you can kill two birds with one stone. By moving the side seam backward we need to make the front waist measurement wider and the back waist measurement smaller. When we make it wider the length of the side seam will shorten (until it's square up with the hips at least) ... thus we need to lengthen it a little to make it match the original measurement and hence the back panel. It won't be much but it will usually correspond to the extra length needed in the front block ... so I tend to let one dictate the other. Furthermore, the narrowing of the back waist measurement will cause a lengthening of the side seam so I chop a bit out of the back block height at the waist line to make it match the original side seam length once again ... the reverse of what we did at the front. The result is often a block/pattern which looks perculiar, but a garment which has far less ripples, especially when the person twists.

Ready to wear designers will ignore almost all of the above because first and foremost they need a garment that has shelf appeal ... one that sits flat by having the front and back panels match with an evenly placed side seam. They want you to try on the garment assuming that you'll miss the finer aesthetic details until well after purchase ... and they're right to do so because most people will! Custom swimwear designers need to heed the above strictly because although the person won't know why, this will be the most significant difference in the feel and look of the garment as the person moves. Don't underestimate it!

Click here to go to Part Three

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