Dressmaking question: what's a "waist stay?"

[gem]

Can anyone define this term for me?  I've seen it crop up in the formalwear forum on PatternReview, but nobody has said exactly what it is.  I can find pictures online (including Jenny LaFleur's Titanic Corset diary!), and I even found a tutorial, but I can't seem to find a definition.  What is it?  What is it for?  What does it do?

Thank you!

[mollymishap]

Well, I've never used a stay strip on a waistline, only across shoulder yokes and at the armsceye when dealing with really stretchy cotton gauze, but I imagine the function is the same: to add stability to that area. 

I imagine from reading the examples/links you gave that if there was no stay strip added, that the nature of the fabric would have been to stretch along that area (makes sense along a waistline) and that such stretch would be unwanted.  This explanation makes sense in the corset link, and maybe to the dress one as well, except that they talk about the stay strip helping with the fall of the skirt.

In reading through the rest of the tutorial of the dress example, it sounds to me that having the waist stay acts as an internal belt of sorts, so that you're shifting the weight of the skirts on to your waist line and off the shoulders.  Having a waist stay also will prevent the seams at the darts from stretching and loosening. 

Maybe you've seen a dress at a store where someone tried on a size that was too small and ended up straining the fabric to such an extent that the weave got messed up at the seams and darts.  Having a non-stretchy stay-strip at the waist would have prevented the destruction of the fabric, but again, in the example you gave, I think the intention is to have the waist stay act as an  "internal belt".

HTH.

[Lady Kathleen of Olmsted]

Last year I worked on a  bunch of Vintage Edwardian clothing  for our local Historical Society where the skirts had a tape that was used as a waist stay. Many of the fabrics for skirting and dresses were lightweight, hand pleated, hand sewn, etc. The waist stay kept things together, for there was a lot of stress to the fragile fabrics. I have also seen tape used for shoulder seams where there can be a lot of stress.

[Kate XXXXXX]

I've used waist stays on both modern and vintage repro stuff, and they have two functions.  One is to take the strain on close fitting garments: you fasten the stay at the waist, and the zip or dress fastening then doesn't need to strain and risk popping open when you bend or sit.

The other is to keep things in place: here there are two sub-functions: the first is to keep the garment in place on the body - to stop it riding up or drifting off and exposing the bits that should be hidden!  The second is to keep the fabric in the folds it's supposed to have, without having a big visible tie on the outside, or awkward pins, or whatever...  Stays of this type appear all over a garment, not just at the waist. 

You sometimes get a double stay in couture garments: one to hold the folds in place, and one to take the strain.  Belt and braces!  Something really delicate and floaty can be held in place by the dressmaker's equivalent of steel hawsers: grossgrain ribbon!

I use an elastic stay (for comfort) to keep the high waistline of a mock Regency gown in place at the front of the dress, while allowing the back to remain loose and skim past the bits one customer likes to hide.

[operafantomet]

Go to: http://whichwitch.no/storyline/Scene_by_scene.htm

Choose "Scene 2 - The Farnese Family", click on the picture, and a video pops up

The blonde lady wears a typical stage waist stay. She doesn't need a corset at all, as she is very slim, but it's used to gather the wide chemise around the waist and to make costume changes smoother.

For historical use it was probably used partly for the same purpose, and partly to avoid any strain on finer outer garbs. It is a newer (19.th century) phenomenon, as far as I can tell. But various BINDINGS, either of waist area or the breasts, can be found maybe as early as in the Minoan culture, and definitely in Greek and Roman times.