For literally YEARS I’ve been meaning to make some braies. Now, finally I figured out a pattern and got a chance to wear my test pair at an event last weekend. In a word.. they’re made of win.. in two words.. win and AWESOME!! Seriously. I will never go to another event without braies on.
These take almost two yards of 58-60″ wide linen.
The legs are 40″ wide and have selvedge at the bottom edge. Yes, I have big thighs. Shut up. The height of the leg pieces is half my fabric width.
With this pattern the seam for the legs ends up in between my thighs.. but I totally didn’t notice it. I used flat-felled seams to attach the gusset to the legs and to close the legs.
I did a short rolled edge (~1/4″) at the top to keep it from fraying and then rolled that again to make a self casing(~1/2″) at the top. I cut slits in the self casing (which I will finish with button hole stitches). I then fed the drawstring into the casing. The drawstring is VERY long.. but it needs to be to make sure I don’t lose it in the casing.
I’m thinking about making a few pairs with elastic in them. I think those will be ok for general wear but probably won’t work if I’m planning to use the braies to hold up chausses.
