Now I am going to weigh in on all this. And as a guy who doesn't work in the foundation industry and who has never bought a bra for any purpose you would think that I have no expertise in this area. But I make two claims. First, I have spent some time studying the problem (e.g. by observing women, braed and braless). And secondly, I have an engineer's perspective. And I contend that there are some serious engineering issues involved.
I am old enough to have started my researches in the pre-silicone era. I remember exploring a large cache of Playboy magazines (we'll skip over how I came in contact with this cache in the interests of brevity) in my callow youth. This allowed me to carefully study a large number of centerfolds side by side. Now all these young ladies had large breasts and, this being in the pre-silicone era, they were all natural. What I observed that is germane to this discussion is that these breasts came in different shapes. There was one young lady in particular who had what I would characterize as "banana breasts". They were large. But they were not hemispherical. They protruded a considerable distance but they stuck out more than they should have in proportion to their diameter. They also had a certain amount of curvature. In this case they curved up somewhat. Hence my characterization of them as "banana breasts". In other women their breasts protruded less and had a greater diameter then the banana breasts. And, scanning down from the top, some breasts start high on the chest and slope out gradually whereas others start lower on the chest and have a more abrupt transition from chest to breast. In short, the breasts on display in these Playboy magazines displayed considerable variation in their shape. This is the kind of thing you notice when you apply the engineer's perspective to the problem.
Now most women are not full enough to be Playboy material. But the same conclusion applies. There is a lot of variation in the shape of breasts, even in "flat chested" women. In extreme cases there seems to be nothing there but chest and perhaps a little nipple. Other women have "pancake" breasts. They cover a lot of area but do not protrude much. (This is actually the ideal shape from a strictly structural engineering perspective.) And then some women have breasts that are not the same size, one breast is noticeably larger than the other. As far as I can tell the general shape of each breast is pretty much the same but the size can differ significantly.
Now let's talk about the perfect breast. There actually is one if you look at the design of most bras and at what our culture pushes. Here it is. Take a flat chest as a starting point. Now take a grapefruit and cut it in half. Attach each half to the chest a little under the arm pits and separated by an inch or two. A few decades ago you would now be done at this point because we were all supposed to pretend that breasts did not have nipples on them. Times have changed so we have to now factor them in. But here too there is an ideal. In this case the nipples must be at the "pole point", what would have been the top or bottom of the grapefruit before we cut it in half. And they should point straight out. They should point neither up nor down and neither left nor right. There seems to no clear consensus on how large nipples should be. Some like them larger and some smaller. This is the sole parameter where two women may have an attribute that differs and still both have perfect breasts.
Now that we have defined the perfect breast we can determine what the purpose of a bra is. The purpose of a bra is to take what a woman actually has and make it look like she has perfect breasts. That, anyhow is the best we can do to come up with a criterion for whether a bra is "right" or not. If the woman wearing the bra has what appears to be perfect breasts then she is wearing the right bra. Otherwise, she is a dumb bunny who has committed the great sin of "wearing the wrong bra". I contend that this is the conventional wisdom on the subject. Any you have probably figured out by now that I hold this particular version of conventional wisdom in low esteem. But let's soldier on a little longer first.
To select the right bra a woman is supposed to take two measurements. First she measures the diameter of her chest just below her breasts. The second measurement consists of again measuring the diameter of her chest. But this time she does it at the fullest part of her breasts. Then for some odd reason she is supposed to subtract two inches from the second measurement. So, for instance her first measurement might yield 34" and the second measurement might yield 38". We subtract 2" from the second measurement to get 36" and we are done. But actually we are not. You can't find a 36x34 (or 34x36) bra. There is a number associated with bra sizes and it is supposed to match the first measurement. So in our case we should get a "34" bra. But the other part of the bra size is a letter. What's the deal there? As far as I can tell the letter indicates the difference between the second measurement and the first. So what we really should do is take the second measurement and subtract it from the first. In our case that would give us 38-34=4. Then we subtract an additional 2 (why? because we are supposed to) leaving us with 2. Then I presume we have a table, e.g. A=1, B=2, C=3, etc. So our example lady should get a 34B bra confident that it is the right bra. Oh, really?
This second measurement is included in each issue of Playboy as the first of the centerfold's "statistics". 38, 24, 36 (typical measurements for the women in question) would be interpreted as the bust (breasts at fullest point - second measurement) waist and hips measurements. And 38, 24, 36 are typical measurements for "busty" girls, exactly the kind of girl who is considered prime centerfold material. But "A" cups are for "flat chested" girls, "B" cups are for girls with something there but not enough to get excited above, "C" cup girls would be "nicely rounded", "D" and up cup girls would be "full figured". Girls who are not full figured do not make it into Playboy centerfolds. So it is safe to say that a centerfold girl should be wearing at least a "C" cup and more likely a "D" or larger. So maybe the table is A=0, B=1, C=2, etc. This would at least put our girl into a "C" cup.
But the situation is actually worse yet. How do we take the second measurement. Let's take as our example here a woman who is somewhere between flat chested and full figure and a little closer to flat chested than full figured. Short hand for all this is the presumed cup size. So what I have in mind is a "B" cup girl. Now this girl might be a seventeen year old in the full flower of her youth with nice firm breasts. We can imagine her taking this "second" measurement wearing no bra at all. Here we would expect a reasonable result. Now fast forward to fifty years later. Some women's breast shape, their "perkiness", holds up well over time. But other women's breasts head south, way south. Their breasts elongate dramatically and droop accordingly. (As far as I can tell the different outcome is more a result of genetics than anything else.) In any case we are talking the same woman so she should measure out the same. But now the fullest part of her chest is not nearly as full as it had been in her youth. So now her "B" becomes an "A" if we are just going by the formula, whatever it is. I have seen one source recommend that the measurement be done while wearing a properly fitting bra. But this is a prime example of circular reasoning. We need the proper bra in order to take the measurement necessary to determine which is the proper bra. I think I have convinced you by now that the standard method of measuring to select a bra is a joke. So what do I suggest as an alternative?
Well that will take more digression. But before taking that digression let me say that the first measurement actually has some usefulness. Bras are complicated garments. But for the purposes of this discussion I will pretend that they consist of only three components: the band, the cups, and the straps. The first measurement is useful for getting the band size correct. OK, now to the (hopefully final) digression.
What is the purpose of the bra? What function is it supposed to perform? I indicated that the standard answer to these questions is "to turn the actual shape of a woman's breasts into that perfect half grapefruit shape". Now I think that for some times and for some women that is the correct answer. But in a lot of cases a different answer is more correct. The creation of the sport bra indicates that some of the time the bra's function is to support and contain the breasts so that the woman can engage in active athletic endeavors. Here generally a bra should squash the breasts close to the chest and constrain their movement. Hemispherical shape is not important. I once had a busty girlfriend who found active exercise painful because her breasts bounced around too much. This was before sport bras became generally available. Had she known of a sport bra option I believe she could have performed the same activity (jogging) safely and comfortably.
Bras to enable athletic activity is just the simplest example. Small girls want their bras to make them look bigger. Big girls often want their bras to make them look smaller. One bra used to be marketed for its ability to "lift and separate". Women with larger breasts often find that their breasts mash together. They would like their bras to create a gap between their breasts. Women with smaller breasts know that pushing their breasts toward each other generates the impression of "cleavage" which generates the impression that their breasts are larger than they actually are. Some women have nipples that naturally point down and out. They would like their bras to make their nipples point straight out and straight ahead. Women sometimes wear tops that have a scoop neck. In this case it helps if the straps are farther apart. Women sometimes wear "choker" styles that leave the shoulders bare so they want the straps closer together. All straps used to be straight up and down in the back. Now straps can also do a cross over or merge into a single central strap that goes down the spine rather than over the collar bones. Given all the different things a woman might want to do she now needs many different bras that have many different attributes. So there is no longer one single perfect bra for an individual. So part of figuring out what the right bra is now involves figuring out what situation the bra will be used in.
There are also limits to what a bra can do. If a woman is literally flat chested I suppose you could go with an "all padding" bra to achieve the perfect grapefruit contour. But if a woman has truly large breasts a bra can't shrink them to grapefruit size. Only a bust reduction operation can do that. And then there's the comfort factor. If you have banana breasts a bra can squish things around to give you a grapefruit (or perhaps a cantaloupe) profile but it may be uncomfortable. And breasts aren't always in the same place on all women. Some are higher or lower than the standard. A bra can provide a certain amount of lift but this pertains to the projecting part of the breast. A bra can not lift the place the breast attaches to the chest. So what can a bra do?
It may be that a bra is not required at all. If a woman does not sag because she has pancake breasts a bra performs no functional (e.g. engineering) purpose. Here the purpose of a bra might be to improve sexiness. The standard idea is to make your breasts appear larger or to increase their projection. But perhaps the alternate strategy of no bra at all might be a more effective method of achieving sexiness. And its cheaper and possibly more comfortable. Surprisingly, there is another group of women for which the right bra might be no bra. That's women with breast implants. Ideally these will have a natural look and feel. But frequently scar tissue builds up that immobilizes the breasts. In this case we have large breasts that are also self supporting. If the bra is there for support then the bra is unnecessary.
Most women are not flat chested but they can be accurately described as "modestly endowed". This is the situation where a bra can be most effective. For many of these women their breasts never do sag much. For those who are less lucky a bra can be very effective at desagging, at restoring that youthful profile. Sag can also be uncomfortable. So desagging may also improve comfort. From an engineering point of view, it's all about forces. This means the weight of the breast material is what matters. And the weight depends on the volume. Here we are dealing with relatively modest volumes and thus relatively modest weights and thus relatively modest forces. For this woman the bra doesn't have to provide much force to effectively reduce sag. A woman might want her breasts to be pushed together to increase "cleavage". Again only a modest amount of force is required to do this.
From an engineering point of view the band provides the anchor. More height in the band provides more area for the force to work against. In the case of modestly endowed women the necessary forces are modest and the band can be relatively narrow. The more full the figure the more substantial the band needs to be. It turns out to be a mistake to use the straps to apply much force. The cups are shaped appropriately to do the work and firmly attached to the band. This should get the job done. The straps should mostly be used to hold the bra in place so they can be narrow and snug rather than tight, regardless of the degree of endowment. Properly adjusted they should therefore be comfortable.
A key component is the under wire. In the case of modestly endowed women an under wire should not be necessary in most cases. This makes it less important that the shape of the cups match the shape of the breasts. So in a lot of cases any old bra will work. The most important attribute is band size. Then the cups must be shaped to perform the desired function (e.g. desag, push the breasts together to generate cleavage, etc.) The standard bra measurements address band size but do not address cup shape. So the only solutions are: (a) a good eye, (b) trying bras on till you find the right one, or (c) consult a professional fitter. Note that if you select option (c) studies have shown that most fitters aren't very good. I think this is because they are just people hired to work in the foundation department who have received little or no training and are not tested.
As we move on to bustier women the work a bra needs to do goes up quickly. As indicated above the forces involved are related to the volume. If we increase the band size by 10% we increase the volume by over 30%. But projection is the killer. Breasts that project 2" have twice the volume of breasts that project 1". Centerfolds can easily have breasts that project 6". This means that breasts of more than modest size and even small amounts of sag that needs to be remedied usually require an under wire. The under wire is needed for engineering reasons. The fabric will not hold its shape without the under wire. If it can't hold its shape then it can't push and pull in the right direction to perform its function.
Now if a bra has an under wire the shape of the under wire is critical. It needs to exactly follow the boundary between the chest and the breast. But as noted above breast shape is highly variable. No one pays attention to under wire shape. So you can't tell if a bra has under wires with the correct shape without looking at the bra and perhaps taking some measurements. The under wire shape is determined by the shape of the cutout in the band. It is critical that this be correct. But it is not the whole story. Once the bra has the right under wire shape then to work correctly it must have the right cup shape. The right cup shape depends on what the bra needs to do.
If it is as sport bra then the cups should be relatively shallow and probably higher than normal. This allows them to flatten and contain the breasts. Note: under wires can be omitted in sport bras designed for larger breasts than with other designs due to the fact that flattening and containment can be achieved more easily with just fabric than other objectives. If an objective is to squish the breasts together then the cup should be shallower on the outside side and deeper on the inside side than in the normal situation. If desagging is important then the cup should be shallower on the bottom than in the normal case.
How much of the breast should be covered depends on function. In the normal case the bottom two thirds to three quarters of the breast should be covered. Bra makers cut their products to be used in this way. If the entire breast is covered then the bra is the wrong size. But the objective may be to display a lot of flesh. This usually means a bra with the straps moved toward the outside. If the plan is to display the tops of the breasts then the straps should be moved to the very outside of the cups and the cup material should be even from side to side. None of this impedes the bra from performing a desag function. But if the idea is to display a lot of cleavage then a different approach is necessary. Here the straps are moved to the outside but less so than in the previous case. Here the cup is cut so that it covers more of the breast on the outside than on the inside. This makes desag more difficult and pushes the breasts together whether that is a desired effect or not. In all these cases, the overall size of the cup should be such that the breasts do not bulge over the top of the bra (cups too small) nor should the bra tend to sag away from the breast (cups too big).
More extreme designs are possible. If all that is desired is desag then only the bottom 30-40% of the breast needs to be covered. The nipple can be completely exposed. These designs are usually referred to as half cup or quarter cup designs. Even more extreme designs are possible (e.g. near 100% exposure) if no desag is required. These designs are sometimes referred to as "open cup" designs. These extreme designs do not permit the breasts to be squashed together and provide a limited ability to re-point the nipples.
The way "and separate" is achieved is to put band material between the cups. The width of the band material between the cups must be close to the actual separation of the breasts of larger breasts. More separation is possible to achieve in the case of smaller breasts.
Larger breasts require more parameters (e.g. cup shape, separation distance between the cups, etc.) to be correct in order for the bra to function properly. Unfortunately, the actual values few if any of these parameters can be determined except by actually examining the bra. The solution, if you are a full figures girl, and if you have a lot of money, is to get your bras custom made by someone who knows what they are doing. A solution that often works is to find a bra brand and style and size that works and stick with that. Unfortunately, even this does not guarantee that each bra will be the same size and shape.
So if you hear someone going on about how 85% or 90% of women are wearing the wrong bra, hold on to your wallet. They are probably trying to sell you some new bras. Of course, they may also be trying to sell you a book. If you think you are wearing the wrong bra read this post. Even if you are confident you are wearing the right bra, read this post. You might decide you were wrong. Even if you decide you got it right in the first place the post is fun and I'm not trying to sell you anything. Only if it doesn't tell you what you need to know to find the right bra and only if you can find a bra fitter that actually knows what she (it's always a she) is talking about does it make sense to put yourself in her hands. As a free extra bonus you can use the contents of this post to test her to make sure she actually does know what she is talking about.
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