Hello all!!!
I thought you guys might have some input, I am looking for a reasonably priced dress form, hopefully adjustable for men and women, we all have about the same sized chest or close enough here, just want one that can be with, or without boobies, probbably a Medium/Large size.
Cheers!
90% of dress forms are female. Adjustaform makes them in lots of sizes, plus a child sized one and a male form. It's not just the chest that's different... You also need to take account of the shoulders and the hips.
I have five. Three different sized female forms, a male form and the child form. No way could I use the male form for a female's garment, even if they did have the same chest measurement.
Doh!!!!
I have a squishy foam dress form. It's not as cheap as the solid hard plastic ones, but it would allow you to do both men and women's shapes:
This one: Uniquely You Your Shape Pinnable Dressform (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00281UISS?ie=UTF8&tag=nome-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00281UISS)
You can find them on eBay occasionally, too, which is how I got mine for cheaper than Amazon.
You could cut the form's chest bumps off with a serrated bread knife or a saw and then make some kind of stuffed/padded bra you could attach when you wanted it to be female.
I got mine when I was a little smaller, which actually worked out well because it's a lot easier to make it bigger than to make it smaller.
It would still have hips (You could shave those down, too), but you could wrap the waist with a towel or some batting. Then you can either create a duct-tape wrap or throw a tight fitting t-shirt on top of it. The extra-small T-shirt will hold everything in place and make a smooth silhouette over the stuffing. That's exactly what I did to make mine my size.
Here is the dress form that my wife has and loves it! Its also fairly cheap. http://cgi.ebay.com/VINTAGE-ADJUSTABLE-MY-DOUBLE-WIRE-DRESS-FORM-MANNEQUIN-/120588461142?cmd=ViewItem&pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c13a1e456 The nice thing about this is that you actually put it on and then someone presses it to fit your body and then you carefully take it off and put the rods in place to hold the shape. This can be done for making anything for any sex and when my wife makes ren garb she puts on her corset and then changes the shape so that it works with the corsetted shape instead of normal shape and when she makes normal clothing, she has me reshape it for her.
Looks cool.
And if you don't want to spend alot of money, I suggest making a duct tape dress form. It's an exact duplicate of your body and it is really cheap. You just need a couple of old t-shirts, several rolls of duct tape, and a friend to mummify you. It is so worth it. I bought a dress form but you know it still isn't shaped like me. I am a curvy woman and my dress form wasn't curvy enough. So I made a duct tape dummy and stuck it over top of my dress form and making garb is so much easier. Here's a link to give you an idea of how to do it.
http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Duct-Tape-Dress-Form (http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Duct-Tape-Dress-Form)
We also made a duct tape dummy for my boyfriend. He wanted a full body form so he bought pvc pipe and hinges, made a pvc skeletal form to his measurements (including hands and feet). Right now *Slim* has a chest, a forearm and a head. I will post pics later on.