betterbinderproject

[betterbinderproject]

Hey yall, I'm newly affiliated with this space, but I've been sewing and tailoring my whole life, including a lot of experience with historical structuring techniques like men's and women's corsetry. As I get more into managing my relationship with my body, I've been working on designing my own binding/compression gear (dysphoria, but also medical compression garments for dysautonomia). It's a work in process, and I'm not quite to mock ups yet, but when I am, they'll go here!

Thanks to the former blog lead for letting me do this!

[betterbinderproject]

Hey, it's @star-anise. I started this project but I've been struggling to keep it going ever since.

I need help.

I'm sure there are ways for people to share information about boned binder experiments, to link examples or review things for sale. I put myself at the bottleneck of this blog when I've struggled to keep my own life together. I can't run a community into the bargain.

So if the people interested in this idea find other ways to assemble and talk about it, I'll do my best to support and aid you by signalboosting. If somebody wants to keep this blog up, let me know.

Once I get my sewing studio back together, I still have more ideas to get back to testing. I just have to be more realistic about what I can and can't do.

[betterbinderproject]

Nemuro Corsets has a boned chest binder you might find interesting to look at.

Oh cool! It’s custom made-to-measure for any size, $170 USD, takes a couple months to make and ship. Has anyone tried it?

[betterbinderproject]

would you say this is a good idea to do with a commercial binder rather than a sports bra? i thought of adding bones to a spectrum outfitters binder particularly since its longer than a sports bra and has a stiff front and stretchable back, but maybe that'd be too much pressure?

Great question! Has anybody tried this? 

@star-anise note: I know that when I started this project, just adding bones to a sports bra didn’t work--they spread out as far apart as the sports bra itself did and it just looked weird. It was adding the elastic strips that provided more compression. It’s my experience with corsetry, too, that bones don’t contribute to the “squeeze” of the garment so much as make it sit more comfortably without wrinkling or grabbing. So it seems to me that adding bones wouldn’t contribute to the compression, but might make the binder sit more smoothly and comfortably.

[betterbinderproject]

congratulations to the person horny enough to make a quarantine lock down diamond heist romantic comedy starring anne hathaway and chiwetel ejiofer

[betterbinderproject]

How much sewing experience would one need? Also do you think a really cheap sewing machine could handle this?

I think most basic machines should be able to do this! I’m not sure about handheld sewing machines because I don’t have any experience with them, but my tabletop sewing machine isn’t anything fancy. It definitely doesn’t need specialized equipment. It can also be done by hand if you have the time and energy.

Forever tip for new sewists: GET TWO SEAM RIPPERS. Seam rippers give you the power to undo mistakes and remake the universe. Seam rippers make you a god. Mistakes are inevitable, so come prepared. Therefore, losing your seam ripper is a cause of great woe and lamentation, and Murphy’s law says that you will inevitably lose your seam ripper. (You’re probably sitting on it, or it’s under your chair.) Get two.

If you’re new to sewing, I think the hardest skill to learn will be sewing the straight lines. If you veer off course, you might make your boning channel  It can take a bit of work before you’re used to guiding and moving the fabric around. To work on those skills, grab a piece of paper or fabric with lines drawn on, and practice your sewing:

This video teaches pivoting, which is a skill you’ll be using a lot for this project. For other projects sewing curves would be useful to practice, but they’re not big in this one.

Technically you can sew this with any needle and any pins. However, if you want your binder to last longer, I recommend a ballpoint/jersey/knit/stretch needle, which means knowing how to change the needle in your machine. Here’s a beginner look at how to change needles, and if that doesn’t work for your machine, often if you google your specific sewing machine model, you can find a manual or a tutorial video that’s more helpful.

[betterbinderproject]

(2/2) - is there a reason (besides being less visible & being able to build off a cheap bra) to only cover the ribcage & not further down like historical stays? do you think it going further down & therefore having longer bones might make it more or less comfortable or flattening? any insight very appreciated. regardless, thank you again, & hope you're well!

Hi! I think that if you’re making a garment of your own instead of altering something off the rack, it would absolutely be better to make it a longer garment. For one, longer bones equal more distribution of pressure, which is easier for wear.

I found with the early prototypes that my bones either had to be quite short (4″) or I had to commit to a garment that went up to about an inch below the collarbone, because in between there’s sometimes a visible “shelf” effect at the top that doesn’t look quite natural. In a perfect world, I’d make the bones cover about the same surface area as GC2B’s half binder.

If the bones go down past the end of the ribcage, you have some issues with mobility because it limits the ability to bend forward at the waist. It’s not an insurmountable problem (and it can be nice to have support at the waist and lower back, especially if you’re doing a lot of squatting or lifting--kind of like a kidney belt) but you definitely have to learn which ways of moving your body is capable of while you’re wearing it, and which it isn’t.

[betterbinderproject]

Hey I’m thinking of throwing my hat in the ring in this project and making an attempt at one of you’re “making a binder with a sports bra and things you can find at the dollar store” binders. Has there been any updates to your designs/ Data since your last post?

Hey! @star-anise here. I’ve been tinkering with designs nonstop but I have very few really useful updates. It’s more like I have 99 new designs that don’t work enough to satisfy me. I also really don’t have what it takes to run a blog this complicated and busy, and am going to work in 2021 to simplify it/bring in help to run it (to do things like handle emails or to find and reblog examples of people trying these concepts out).

Small tip: If you’re using dollar store needles, take a good look at their eyes before you buy them. That’s the hole at the top of the needle the thread goes into. I’ve been to dollar stores where some needle packs on display are very normal, but in others, the needle eyes aren’t open all the way so they can’t be threaded, or haven’t been evenly cut out, so you can see jagged bits of metal left inside the eye, which makes them hard to thread and then could possibly shred your thread as you sew. So keep an eye out for that. If you’re using regular sharp needles, consider sewing with the eye end first so you’re poking between the threads of the fabric instead of potentially piercing the threads with a sharp tip; that’s not a worry when you sew with woven fabrics, but with the knit fabrics this project uses, it could affect how much wear and tear your binder can endure. Alternately, consider going to a sewing/fabric store and investing in ballpoint/knit/jersey needles instead (which is generally $5-10)

The biggest change I’d suggest to the process itself is about the elastic ends--the elastic tended to give out in the test binders, so instead of leaving the cut ends raw, I’d suggest turning them over once or twice and stitching them down like a strap end before attaching them to the garment. Like this:

Oh I guess the other thing is, your mileage may vary about whether you want a bone around the side/back of the binder:

Some wearers found the side/back bone important to their comfort because it evened out the pressure being put on their shoulderblades; others found it really annoying when it jabbed them when they were putting it on, or found it poked into their armpits. So be thoughtful about whether you want it or not, and where you place it.

[betterbinderproject]

Heya! Do you have a moment to talk about the kind of fabric you used to make these prototypes? I know that, for the sake of ease and accessibility, they’re adapted sports bras, and the material looks sort of t-shirty. I’ve made corsets before and they usually take really stiff material, like the canvas in the chest part of my binder. Do you have any thoughts on how the stretchiness vs stiffness of the fabric affects this garment?

I think the ideal binder would be half stiff and half stretch. The waist of a corset is trying to cinch in a column of muscle, which is very difficult, so of course you want to bring all the force possible with stiff fabric and boning. However, the upper chest is a very different affair, because the ribcage is very solid and should not be compressed very much, while the chest we want to flatten is easily-squishable fat. 

Although humans can make our stomachs expand when we breathe, as in diaphragmatic breathing, this isn't strictly necessary. Our lungs are in our chests, and it's mostly the ribcage that expands when we breathe. Traditional corsetry compresses the waist but allows the chest to expand, and the traditional result of an expanding chest and a non-expanding corset has been the "heaving bosoms" of great lore: The breasts push against the corset and rise up because there is no more room for them inside the garment. 

However, this is not something we want with a binder. We want the breast tissue to already be pressed flat. Therefore, it needs somewhere else to go. I think that failing to give the ribcage enough room to expand accounts for a lot of the pain and breathing problems non-stretch binders cause. So I'd say that the front half of a binder would do a lot better if it could easily stretch out a few inches so its wearer could breathe without the chest trying to rearrange itself. 

The biggest problem I've found so far with my current binder model is that the elastic becomes overstretched in the back, causing the entire garment to become baggy and loose. Ideally, the back half of the garment would be non-stretch, just accommodating the shape of the ribcage without trying to exert much pressure on it. (In wearing similar garments I've found that a little light boning in the back makes it more comfortable, but isn't 100% necessary.) 

So if I were making a completely new garment from scratch, I'd use two different materials for the front and back. The back, non-stretch version would be fitted with the chest expanded, and then the stretch version would easily provide compression, but not so much that its wearer can't breathe deeply. And less compression is necessary if the garment is boned than if it isn’t.

[betterbinderproject]

Could you recommend places in which I can buy things to make better binder?

@star-anise here! You’ve got some choices ahead of you.

I tried limiting the materials for my design to things you could buy at any store that has a “sewing” section, like a Walmart, grocery stores, or dollar stores. There are fancier things you can get if you go to a specialized sewing places (Walmart with a sewing section, JoAnn’s, Fabricland, etc). and if you want the niche option of spring steel boning, you’ll have to go to the real specialists. For this post I’ll link to independent fabric stores online, of which there are A TON.

I personally am a fan of local fabric stores (especially independent stores) so you can talk to the staff and ask questions, but I have the advantage of being a cis woman and 😔 fabric stores can be very hit-or-miss about being sensitive to the needs of anyone who isn’t a cis woman. So your mileage may vary.

Base garment - I’ve only used Fruit of the Loom so far; I like them because they’re fairly simple and made of breathable cotton. Here’s their selection of styles - I’ve used the strappy and tank versions, which have the trade-off where the tank is visible under a wider variety of shirts but well-suported and less likely to move, and the strappy one is easier to hide but a little less supported. I haven’t yet tried, but I want to, the front-closure model, since I think it would be way easier to put on. You can buy directly from them, or use their “where to buy” page.

Elastic - widely available, but for an example, from Fabrications or The Workroom; I’ve seen it in local dollar stores and fabric shops.

Boning - Heavy Duty Cable Tie option - From Home Depot; I’ve also seen it in dollar stores and sometimes electronics shops; needs 3/4″ twill tape (and a utility knife or heavy duty scissors to cut)

Boning (6mm x 10cm or 1/4″ x 4″) Spring Steel option (less bulky than the cable ties) - Farthingales, corsetmaking.com

Boning Cover - Twill Tape Option - Farthingales, Corsetmaking.com, 

Boning Cover - Bone Casing Option - Farthingales, corsetmaking.com, 

I hope that helps? It still feels like this is a lot of information and I’m being very, “Have ALL the choices!” instead of streamlining things and making them feel less intimidating.

[betterbinderproject]

So is this project still active? I’m very curious about it and while I’ve only every really sewn basic repairs and embroidery on crochet projects, I’m very invested and do have access to a sewing machine and like, free time

@star-anise here: I am still here, ish. Nobody else has volunteered to help sort through correspondence, so I'm doing it in a pretty haphazard fashion. If anyone wants to sew more test binders, hooray! I'm kind of doodling around with more ideas, since the test binders with rigid boning had a few problems--poking people putting them on, poking in the armpits, etc. I'm trying to find if there are less-stiff forms of boning that will do the same thing (rolled-up duct tape? cotton cord?) or, alternately, if it works better if I use front-open bras, like this.

[betterbinderproject]

Hi! I was wondering, would synthetic whalebone bs a viable option for boning, or would it warp too much from body heat to be effective?

I have no experience using synthetic whalebone, sorry! I kind of suspect the only way to know would be to test it and see what happens.

[betterbinderproject]

Hi! I apologize if you've already answered this, but could the sewing in the binder project be done by hand? I'd love to participate but I don't really have the space for a sewing machine.

Yep! It would take a while, but you could definitely do it by hand. The only really important thing to remember is that when you’re attaching elastic to the garment, you can’t use an ordinary straight stitch the way you would on the boning. Instead you’d have to use a diagonal stitch like this one, so your stitches will stretch along with the elastic.

Good luck!

[betterbinderproject]

Hi Lis! I'm hoping you can give me Binder Sewing Advice - a friend of mine sent me his old swim binder, and it's a little loose in the chest, so I want to take it in. I have a sewing machine but I know very little about sewing. Do you know what techniques I should use to make the seams strong enough, and what kind of thread? also I've been madly appreciating your posts lately

Oh yay a sewing ask!!

First thing: GET A SEAM RIPPER. GET THREE SEAM RIPPERS.

Sometimes you make mistakes. Sometimes you need to take stitches out on purpose. Sometimes you’ve sewn two left sleeves. Mistakes happen! But with seam rippers, you have the power to unmake reality. You can undo mistakes. You are like a GOD with a seam ripper. You can get ones with fancier handles, and those are great, but I spread my money out on buying multiple cheap ones because I have ADHD and misplace them a lot and there is no despair like needing a seam ripper and not being able to find it.

Okay. Onwards.

Keep reading

[betterbinderproject]

Hey, this is @star-anise on a sideblog! I would super super love if you’d be willing to look over my stuff at @betterbinderproject and tell me what you think! What I ended up trying was a combination of stretchy elastic for ease of fit and movement, and boning to evenly distribute the pressure of compression. It’s promising in the short term, but I’ve had really slow progress recruiting more sewists to produce more binders. I kind of took a break from the project for the last few months (other than fulfilling web orders for DIY binder kits with stays and elastic) but I’d like to get back to it in 2019, possibly solving some of my logistical difficulties by recruiting test-wearers in my city.

I’ve also got some research notes on early 19thcen short stays that might be relevant too (and I should have a post about children’s training corsets, but I can’t find it, dammit; but we know that in the 18th and 19th centuries, children wore smaller versions of adult stays beginning a few years before puberty, to support their skirts and get them used to the way of moving in it, and the practice likely started earlier). 

This is ALL conjecture, but basically: I think that children’s training stays would be an inspiration to what we’d today call a transmasculine person to use corset-like binding, because they could just think, “I like how my old/current stays press me flat, and I don’t want new ones made roomier or cut lower to make my shape more pronounced”.

I also think that chest-specific stays like the short stays that look like a paleolithic ancestor of the bra from the  Kyoto Costume Institute (picture in those research notes) probably existed well before they became universally popular in 1795, because they’re perfect to wear when pregnant or nursing, when the midsection is much larger but breasts need even more support than ever; so I think it’s the kind of thing that, while not historically attested, would make a lot of sense a la, “This technology and these social institutions were quite likely all around from 1500 onwards, and it would make sense for people to have used them in this way.”

THINGS I NEED TO FUCKING KNOW: Why every fuckin trans man or nb person I know who binds is like “oh binders are the worst, you can’t breathe in them, I know someone who broke a rib once”,

And meanwhile over in historical costuming, we are fucking eating, sleeping, swordfighting, riding horses, and feeling great like this:

(credit: Jenny La Flamme, The Tudor Tailor, Verdaera)

Like is there NO overlap between people who want to bind and people who care about accurate 16th century clothing reconstruction techniques?

(I, okay, maybe it is kind of a niche interest, but…. REALLY? Anyone who’s made a boned binder, PLS SPEAK TO ME)

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[betterbinderproject]

Here’s the stable backup for this blog, in case anything happens to the Tumblr.

[betterbinderproject]

hey trans friends

if you need binders/breast forms/makeup/etc but don’t want your parents to know, now is the best time to get it. 

you can order whatever it is online and when the package comes in if the ask what it is you can say something like “it’s a secret!” or even just sssh them. they’ll assume it’s a present for whatever holiday you celebrate and probably won’t press the issue.