A snippet I would like to share about corsets in 1913 plus questions about bust support.

[Yvonne De Rooij]

I was talking about old (edwardian to 1949) books on sewing with TheLongHairedFlapper on her youtube channel, and she recommended some freely downloadable books from archive . com

Comments

[ext_3749756]

Spine twisting was a poor choice of words on my part. I think forcing the spine into an uncomfortable or unnatural position would be more accurate.

"But neither they nor you nor any man's army will convince me that every Edwardian lady wore her corsets sensibly" I agree.
I was approaching this from the view of "this and that was done by a lot of people and available to a lot of people, so it was period accurate, I will pick and choose what I think is the most healthy from those things" so as to minimize damage and optimize comfort.
I am not under the impression from Cathey Hay's article that she thought everyone did those things either.
Afaik most middle class women had off the rack corsets, a lot of those were postal order corsets.
You just provided your intended waist measurement and that was it.
Rich people could afford custom made corsets, I believe this is also the most comfortable.
If I were to make one myself I would choose the length to fit me (so custom lengths) but go with the proportions from a ready made pattern for my intended waist size and then padding it.
Or to put it differently I wish to purchase a pattern for an edwardian corset, alter the lengths to fit me but go with the widths the pattern itself gives.

"I am automatically suspicious of photos of actresses or others who got their livings by entertaining the public." As you should be as those pictures were also often re-touched.

There are plenty of candid photographs on the internet of non-celebrity women going about their business in the early edwardian era, you can tell from those pictures that don't appear to be tight laced (I guess most of those women didn't find it practical) and they don't have the exaggerated stance/silhouette/posture that was popular in the era.
You can still tell it's the edwardian era, and they still wear the fashion of the time.
Usually long skirts with petticoats, a regular blouse (I supposed they called it a "shirtwaist") with either bust ruffles or a ruffled corset cover underneath plus a corset.
There doesn't seem to be heavy padding going on.

"Neither has it escaped me that often, the reader wants to be spoon-fed, wants to avoid having to think for him- or herself, and wants above all else to be absolutely, unequivocally RIGHT."
I don't think that's a bad thing to want.
I have spent many hours reading articles online and books irl, watching videos, and examining corsets I bought. I'm not opposed to doing my own homework.
However if I am going to spend money on a book I want it to have enough new information for me to justify the expense. Otherwise it would be better not to buy it.
When I say that I wish there was something that went into depth about victorian and edwardian corsets, yes I want to be spoonfed if I am paying a lot for it.
These books are written by people who know a lot more than I do, usually fashion historians who had access to resources I don't have access to, and books of this caliber are usually 80+ dollars.

I absolutely love Linda Sparks's corset building book. It does what it says on the cover and the layout/design was very well chosen.
Different approaches to construction are explained, each construction method comes with a step by step explanation with pictures illustrating each step.
It takes all of the mystery out of the basics.
It spoon feeds you the basics, and that's why I love it. Believe me when I say I still had to do my own thinking and decision making, but I didn't have to re-invent the wheel on my own.
Books like this allow you to progress very quickly because they spoon feed you, and I say that is along the lines of "work smarter, not harder".

This is the information age, I don't see a point to re-inventing the wheel on your own if there are all of these resources around.
Someone else is doing the work/research, and I'm willing to pay for it and I still end up having to fill the information gaps with my own guesswork.
I don't expect anything to be 100% complete and 100% accurate.

Sorry if I come over as defensive, to me it seemed you thought badly of people who wanted to be spoonfed. I personally consider wanting to be spoonfed a good thing, as you are working smarter not harder and it helps you be more critical of the first books you buy so you save money and time.

[virginiadear]

H'mm.
You've given me some things about which to think, so I will go,now, and think about them.

[ext_3749756]

Sorry if I said anything rude or offensive or perhaps I came over as preachy, that was not my intent.
I cannot imagine what it is like to be a person who had to figure it out all on their own with no patterns, no books and only historical corsets to look at and now finds themselves in a time where a lot of corset knowledge is available for free by doing a simple google search.