The Right Bra - From Wacoal

This is a bit of a departure. I don’t generally discuss unmentionables, but I actually learned something this week that concerns the lingerie drawer so I thought I’d share. One of my favorite bra brands is Wacoal – a Japanese company that has been a strong contender in the American market for 25 years. Apart from offering an extraordinary range of sizes, Wacoal’s success lies in its all-female team of designers who balance form and function in every style. Let’s face it – almost everyone knows these bras are always a solid purchase.

Better than Wacoal being on Gilt Groupe the other day was the unexpected invitation I received to a private Wacoal blogger event at the Prescott Hotel earlier this week. The event promised happy hour cocktails, nibbles, and….free bras fitted by expert Wacoal brand representatives. When faced with such a bounty all you want to do is share the wealth, so I grabbed Kim of J’Adore Couture and together we braved the rainy afternoon in the name of free undies. Almost as soon as we arrived, we ran into Amber of Amber’s Notebook, who was equally excited and ready to dig into the rack of frillies. The atmosphere was fun and welcoming, but you could tell we were all a little edgy. It takes a bit of courage to bare it all in front of a perfect stranger, so it was nice to have some girlfriends there (as well as a glass of wine!) to keep the mood from slipping into complete trepidation.

For some reason the prospect of going into a bra fitting makes most of us dread the lingerie department. We start to judge ourselves about our imperfections, and then the whole idea just snowballs into a giant wad of discontent and discomfort. Thankfully, the Wacoal group was friendly, kind, and also encouraging, taking away the weirdness.

The collection presented included pieces from Wacoal’s general collection as well as their b.tempt’d line which launched in 2009. Their brand representative also talked up the collection of shapewear pieces, which are now formulated with ingredients such as caffeine, vitamin E and aloe to help moisturize and increase firmness in the skin.

“Will it make me look like Angelina Jolie?” Kim asked cheekily.

Luckily for us mere mortals, shapewear is no longer the dirty little secret it was a few years ago. Thanks to stylists such as Rachel Zoe who admit to always providing shapewear to Hollywood’s best bods, we can all admit to owning some. Why not? It’s always helpful, even on a good day!

For my fitting, I worked with Sue – an expert from Wacoal who manages the North Bay and Downtown San Francisco areas. Five minutes with her and I knew more about bras than ever before. Sue advised me on fit and gave me a light scolding for not taking better care of my lingerie.

“You always want your underwire to clear your breast tissue – that’s really important.” She advised. She also looked a little alarmed when I admitted to tossing my bras in the laundry, albeit on the gentle cycle. “You should really hand wash them. Use a really really mild soap – shampoo even. I know a gal who washes out her bras in the shower and then hangs them up. It goes really fast. You don’t need to wash after every single wear, but hand-washing is a must! Other than hand-washing, the most important thing to do is rotate. Never wear the same bra two days in a row. A steady rotation will save your bras and make them last.” Sue suggested buying multiples of the same style and rotating through them during the week.

Enlightened by this knowledge, I vowed to myself to go home and have a long hand-washing session in the bathroom sink.

As Kim emerged from her fit session, she looked like a charmed, but bewildered deer in the headlights.

“Wow, I’ve been wearing the wrong bra size!” She admitted.

“Wrong by a lot, or a little?”

“WRONG BY A LOT! I had no idea!” When Amber joined us again she also admitted to having the wrong size. I had been fitted last year at Nordstrom so my sizing was pretty close, but still had some changes. While I had gone down in my bust measurement, I had gone up in cup size. How this happens is one of those great mysteries of the human body which I don’t have the patience to explore, but I’m not complaining.

So all of the weirdness and judgement about bra fittings is all for naught – if we’d just face the measuring tape once a year we’d all be a lot more comfortable and less judgmental. For some reason the correct bra size gives you that kind of confidence.  

For our free selections, Kim picked out the Lots of Luxe bra, while Amber & I chose from the b.tempt’d collection – Ciao Bella for me, and La Parisienne for her.

We left the gathering with one of those relieved, delighted feelings – like how you feel after you go confess your sins. We all know how guilty the wrong bra makes us feel!