Apparel with Built-in Undergarment
An article of apparel includes an outer garment which is provided with built-in inner garment. The inner garment, which serves as a foundation garment, may be made of SPANDEX material. The inner garment is secured to the inside of the outer garment at the waist.
In the modern world most ladies want to appear trim and thus the advent of various figure enhancing undergarments. The typical woman has various styles of dresses, skirts and pants, some of which are designed to be tighter fitting than others. A tight fitting outer garment may require a different undergarment than a more loosely fitting dress. Thus a lady must take the time to choose an appropriate undergarment and the time to sequentially fit the undergarment and the outer garment. While adjustable corsets have been used, such require excessive time and effort to adjust and fit.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTIONThis invention provides apparel with a built-in form-shaping undergarment. The undergarment includes a relatively wide band encircling its attachment location made from an elasticized material such as SPANDEX which will not roll and which retains it shape after multiple cleanings. The undergarment has downwardly or upwardly extending (or both) contoured shaping layers of SPANDEX type material, which minimally forms an undergarment that provides the desired fit for the lady and may affect the shape of the outer garment to which it is attached.
The invention is illustrated in the accompanying drawings in which:
Referring to
An important feature is the use of a SPANDEX type block copolymer of polyurethane and polyethylene glycol material that provides sufficient support and retention and that is dimensioned to both cover sufficient areas of concern, while still being fully covered by the outer garment so that that the undergarment is not detected regardless of the normal positions employed by those wearing the garment. Different devices of fiber can be used for the entire SPANDEX portion, or different deniers may be used for difference areas.
The undergarment may or may not be reinforced locally at the area indicated as 9. Alternately, the garment may be graded to have diminishing elasticity away from the waistband.
It is intended that the scope of the present invention include all modifications that incorporate its principal design features, and that the scope and limitations of the present invention are to be determined by the scope of the appended claims and their equivalents. It also should be understood, therefore, that the inventive concepts herein described are interchangeable and/or they can be used together in still other permutations of the present invention, and that other modifications and substitutions will be apparent to those skilled in the art from the foregoing description of the preferred embodiments without departing from the spirit or scope of the present invention.
Claims
1. An item of personal apparel comprising:
- an outer garment and
- an inner garment connected to said outer garment including a layer of material that provides support and/or retention qualities to those wearing the personal apparel.
2. An item of personal apparel according to claim 1 wherein said outer garment is a dress and wherein said inner garment is attached to said outer garment only at the waist.
3. An item of personal apparel according to claim 2 wherein said inner garment extends only from the waist down.
4. An item of personal apparel according to claim 1 wherein said inner garment extends from the waist up.
5. An item of personal apparel comprising:
- an outer garment; and
- an elastic girdle attached to said outer garment at the waist and extending above and outside said outer garment toward the chest.
6. An item of personal apparel according to claim 1 wherein said inner garment has different thicknesses at different locations corresponding to different support qualities.
Type: Application
Filed: Apr 4, 2008
Publication Date: Oct 9, 2008
Inventor: Bonita D. Griffin (Simpsonville, SC)
Application Number: 12/062,608
International Classification: A41D 1/22 (20060101); A41C 1/00 (20060101); A41D 1/00 (20060101);