We Tested Out Historical Bras And Surprisingly One Of Them Managed To Pass

One of these is, like, the official bra of tree murder.

Look, we all hate our bras, but can you imagine the kind of horrible monstrosities our foremothers had to deal with? For Ladylike, Freddie and I did more than imagine — we wanted to try out some historical bras for ourselves.

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This is Freddie and I. She has smaller boobs, and I have bigger boobs, so we thought we'd try some bras from history together in order to try to ~round out~ the vintage bra experience:

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First, we tried the strophion, which was a bust support worn in ancient Greece and Rome, and is essentially just a very long piece of linen toilet paper.

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Very long. Like, the length of your intestines long.

Here's how the ancient Greek and Roman bra* looked on Freddie and me (Freddie is a B cup, I am an F cup):

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*Also, the word "bra" doesn't come around until way later in history (the 20th century), so we're calling it that just for funsies.

We were both on the same page when it came to this bra. It was basically impossible to figure out how to tie, and it had lots of other logistical difficulties we hadn't thought of before.

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Also, the knots did not last for long, although that may have been because we were not great at tying them. Freddie pointed out that because she had much less boob to support the bra, it basically started slipping down her chest immediately.

Overall, we both felt the bra had the bizarre sensation of making you feel squished yet unsupported all at once.

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It was sort of like tying your wet hair up in a towel after a shower: It'll stay for a second, but don't try to run down the block while wearing it.

Next, we tried the first actual bra to be patented in the United States of America, from 1914, which naturally looks like every top that Britney Spears wore in 1999:

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Here is Freddie and I wearing the 1914 bra:

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We both agreed that this bra is basically just a cute top:

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But we had a split opinion on this bra's overall usefulness and comfort. Fred was pro this bra, I was...not as pro.

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Fred probably could have worn this for like four days in a row and been perfectly peachy. I, on the other hand, forgot that necklines were probably much higher in 1914, and the lack of support meant that I spent much of the day drowning in boob sweat.

Last, we tried the class "bullet" or "torpedo" bra (aka the Madonna cone-shaped bra) from the 1940s.

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Here is Freddie and I in the 1940s bra:

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We both agreed that this bra was a regular ol' bra...until you turned to the side.

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Also, for both of us, the tips of these bras required more maintenance than we thought they would; they had to be continuously adjusted.

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That's because in order for the tips of these bras to maintain their structural integrity, they had to be stuffed with a lot of toilet paper. There were times when I would lean over and toilet paper would fall out.

Also, how weird is it that in the 1940s, there was a popular bra where the whole gimmick was that the tips of the cups suggested the appearance of nipples? The 1940s!

Overall, we both agree that bra technology has come a long way, even if it still has a loooooong way to go.

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