The 36-year-old founder of this lingerie brand wants to create Singapore’s most comfortable bras

Elfaine Tan remembers when bras with metal underwires were a staple in many women’s wardrobes. The founder of Singapore lingerie brand I’m In was in her teens then, and recalled how uncomfortable the bras were.

“Back then, a lot of times, the bras were purchased by our mums. I don’t remember questioning my mum about it,” the 36-year-old laughed.

In fact, Tan said that she wore these wired bras to death – even when the underwires, as a result of wear and tear, began to poke out through the fabric into her flesh. She thought this was “normal” and would just push the wires back in.

Sometimes, at work, when fidgeting with her bra would be unsightly, she would ignore the discomfort. The protruding wires caused redness and abrasions. What she did not expect was that over time, they developed into a brownish discoloration, she told CNA Women.

This was why in 2015, the former director at SingPost decided to launch her own lingerie brand, I’m In. The Singaporean believes that no woman should ever have to put up with uncomfortable bras.

However, although Tan’s vision was to make comfortable wireless bras, she was a newbie in the business. The minimum order quantity required by factories was very high and bras are complicated to make – a standard bra features 30 to 50 parts – including the mould, various layers that go into the cup, padding, sidebands, hooks and straps.

Then just 26 years old, Tan decided to sell underwear first to buy herself time to learn the ropes about bras. Two years later in 2017, she launched her first wireless bra.

HER BRA-MAKING JOURNEY

Tan’s first bras were ready-made wireless designs sourced from China, with slight modifications to the straps, hooks and colours. She started with 12 designs.

It was a steep learning curve. “I paid a lot for the ‘lessons’. There was one time, the bras that came looked okay, but when you wore them, they became deformed,” she recalled. The factory used cheaper, less dense foam, she discovered.   

However, after many hurdles and speed bumps, she has since successfully launched a sizeable collection of wireless bras, growing from an e-commerce brand to four stores in Singapore.

Another challenge she had was convincing women to switch from underwire bras to wireless ones. “A lot of people might think that only a wired bra is supportive – that is the usual misconception,” Tan said.

“We share with customers that just because you wear a wireless bra doesn’t mean that your boobs have become saggy and you will have no support.”

A wireless bra features more layers than wired bras to give breast support, Tan said. However, these extra layers won’t make you sweat a lot more – most are around the bra cup, not underneath or in between the breasts, which are prone to sweating.

Bra cups feature “different meshes and different density of foams between the outer and inner fabric. Sometimes… we use plastic at the side to give the bra shape,” she explained.

Because of this, I’m In wireless bras provide support for larger breasts, and run up to size 4XL or 44E, said Tan. They also come in different designs, from halter to low necklines, and have built-in or removable sponges that can range from 0.5cm to 4cm in thickness for a push-up effect.

Tip: If you’re going for more cleavage, look for padding at the side of the bra cup to push the breasts inwards. For rounder breasts, look for padding that extends to the bottom of the cup to push the breast up, Tan said.

However, one wireless design she felt was not up to par were strapless bras.

As women perspire, existing wireless strapless bras tend to shift, slip and look mishappen in tight-fitting clothing, requiring women to constantly adjust their bras throughout the day, she said.

Many brands also use silicone along the under band of the bra and in the bra cups to help the bra stick to the skin. This, Tan felt, was uncomfortable in Singapore’s hot and humid weather.

In 2018, Tan decided to design her own bra – the 100% Non-Slip Strapless Bra. Silicone-free, the bra has rubber at the top and bottom, as well as a piece of non-slip fabric at the side band to prevent it from slipping and sliding. This bra’s design has been refined five times over the years, and remains one of the brand’s bestsellers.

“Customers tell me that when they run for the bus, it won’t drop. We have a lot of customers who are OLs (office ladies). When they go from meeting to meeting, it stays up. So there is no need to do this ugly thing where they keep pulling and shifting,” she said.

COMFORT-FOCUSED BRA DESIGN

The pandemic catalysed a shift towards comfort-focused design and wireless bras. And I’m In rode this trend.

“During COVID-19, a lot of frontliners wore our bras. Because when they wear PPE (personal protective equipment), it is so hot and humid. Our Air-ee bra range absorbs and dispels sweat very well,” Tan said.

What Tan wanted to improve was the fabric. “It gets loose very quickly. And because the fabric is so smooth and soft, when you scratch it, linting (unsightly textile fibre and fluff) appears,” she said.

She worked with a factory in China to create her own – a “very long, daunting process”, Tan said.

Her team would send the fabrics they liked to the laboratory to find out their composition, and then went about adjusting the composition, such as the spandex percentage, for better stretch recovery (the ability of a material to return to its original size after being stretched).

Once the factory had created samples of the new fabrics, they would test it. “For example, they would throw it into their industrial washer and wash for 30 cycles. Did it shrink or they become bigger?” she said. Tan’s team would do their own testing as well.

It took six to nine months for Tan to create the perfect fabric, one that was soft, smooth, sweat-wicking and absorbent, with good stretch recovery and linting resistance. It is now incorporated in many of the brand’s bras.  

She said that regardless of design, comfort is key in all intimate wear. “It is a very basic requirement… a wireless bra is game-changing.”

Tan is now working on launching a machine-washable organic cotton range, featuring 12 per cent spandex and 88 per cent cotton instead of nylon in November.