Off the Rack ~ Fitting the Bottom Half of the Hourglass: Panty Reviews

I’ve written a couple articles now about panties for the hourglass figure. On the search for the perfect pair, I’ve started branching out and trying new brands. This week I’ll be sharing five different underwear styles across three brands, and gauging my success with them as a woman with a rather ample rear compared to my waist measurement.

My natural waist is about 29″ and my hips are 41″ at the widest point. As such, my waist usually falls into size medium and my butt size large. After noticing that a lot of my size medium underwear is creating massive panty-lines and near-constant wedgies, I’ve started buying size large instead. But even then, it’s still hard to find a truly good fit. Hmm, this is sounding familiar…

First up is two types of underwear from a brand called Warner’s. I found these by browsing on BareNecessities.com when they had an underwear sale a couple months ago. I was looking for something that wasn’t too low-rise, with good butt coverage, no panty-lines, and no muffin top pinching. I ended up with the “No Pinching, No Problems Hi-Cut Brief” and the “No Wedgies, No Worries Hipster.”

Here are stock photos of the briefs:

These still look pretty low-rise, right? Well they’re not. I think the photo is a little deceiving. They are most definitely a high mid-rise (and I say this as someone with an extremely long torso). So I’m a little limited in which pants I can wear with them.

The fabric is a silky and soft microfiber. I really love the way it feels. The wide waistband is also really fabulous. It hides elastic within the wide band, so it truly doesn’t pinch or create muffin tops. It gives a nice, smooth look.

My biggest complaint is that the legs are cut a little too high. It cuts across my butt cheeks and feels like it’s perpetually on the verge of turning into a wedgie. These are also very granny-looking on the body.

As for sizing, Bare Necessities uses a weird sizing system of numbers 5–8. The size chart only lists hip measurement, and I corresponded to a 7. Of course, when I received the underwear, I discovered that its own label uses the usual word size, in my case Large. So really, 5 is a small, 6 medium, 7 large, and 8 extra large.

The large is a little big for me. There’s too much fabric in the crotch and the butt feels a bit saggy. But I’m afraid if I had ordered Medium, it would pinch on the sides and give me phantom muffin tops.

Next up is the hipster:

These photos are more accurate. I’m quite pleased with this pair and would certainly order them again. Unfortunately, all the fun colors are sold out in my size, otherwise I might have already done so. I have enough tan and black underwear, thankyouverymuch.

Anyhow, these are low rise enough to wear with my mid-rise jeans (which on my torso are more like low-rise), but not so low that the bikini line is visible. There’s excellent back coverage and I’m pleased to note that they really do live up to the claim of being wedgie-free. Instead of having a wide waistband, this time the wide band is around the legs. The legs are also cut lower so that the fabric actually cups under my butt cheeks and not across them.

Again the crotch is a little baggy, but I think that’s because it’s simply cut too wide. I find this to be a problem with loads of panties. It’s like they’re designed for a huge thigh gap or something. I frequently have fabric bunching up on either side of the crotch because the space between my legs is far narrower than the piece of fabric.

The last underwear I bought from BN is the Maidenform Microfiber Boyshort:

I often have trouble with boy-shorts because the front will be too long and the back too short, so I end up with excess fabric bunching up in the front, and my butt not fully covered in back. One of the underwear listings I looked at on BN even noted that the front and back were exactly the same—as if that’s a good thing. No matter how small your posterior may be, it’s always going to have at least a little more volume than your front side, right? So why would you wear symmetrical undies??

I’m happy to report that these Maidenform shorts do not have the same length in back as in front. When you lay them out, they are clearly longer in back at both the top and bottom. Thus, I have full coverage in back, covering the entire length of my rear—no plumber’s butt! They’re also long enough that there are no wedgies or riding up at the bottom edge.

To be fair, the front is a little long for me, so I do get a bit of bunching. But it’s minimal and I don’t feel it. It’s more of an aesthetic thing.

The fabric is thinner than the microfiber of the Warner’s underwear and isn’t as silky, but it’s still perfectly comfortable. And the lace trim keeps it from pinching in. The lace texture might show through really clingy fabric, but otherwise it’s not visible. I bought these in 7 (aka Large) and they fit perfectly. They are not saggy anywhere and don’t feel loose or tight. They’re just right.

And finally, we return to my old friend, the Hanky Panky Bare Collection. After seeing the new colors and boy-short style at CurvExpo, I was eager to try the pale pink “vanilla” shade and the new cut. With a fat coupon courtesy of flash sale site Gilt.com, I purchased two more high-rise thongs as well as a traditional thong and the new boy-shorts. Sadly, the boy-shorts are not yet available in vanilla, so I went with the taupe color, but the others are all in the pale pink.

I order all of my Hanky Panky in size Large. And honestly, I think they run a little small. The Large is definitely the right size for me, so anyone who’s even just a little bigger would be sized out. Buying these a size small would defeat their entire purpose, since it would create lumps instead of smoothing them. Maybe some day they’ll introduce some XL’s. They offer XS, after all!

First up is the traditional thong:

This is the actual color I purchased. The model is quite tan so it stands out a lot, but on my lily-white body, it blends into my skin much better than the taupe does. I have to be very careful to only wash it with like colors, though!

Ordinarily I am not a fan of thongs. But I wear a lot of jersey dresses and those things show terrible panty-lines. So it’s a necessity sometimes. However, the Hanky Panky Bare thong is so thin and free of seams that I can’t even feel it. It’s easily one of the most comfortable pieces of underwear I own, if you can believe it.

They’re totally invisible under clothing. However, I think it was a poor decision to place a seam on each side of the waistband. The high-rise thong only has one seam down the back. It’s really a minor complaint, though, and the reason I care is purely because I intend to wear this under my Cheetara costume—little more than a leotard and tights, which show every seam. The more seamless I can get my undergarments, the better (it’s bad enough having that big, fat line from my tights right up the middle!).

Moving on, I have mixed feelings about the boy-short:

As a positive, they are appropriately longer in back than in front. And they are amazingly invisible, as the following photos will show. As you can see, this fabric is so thin and clingy that you can see my belly button through it. It’s a bit excessive, really. And I’ve struggled to find underwear that doesn’t show. The Bare boy-shorts are the first I’ve found that actually work.

However, since there’s no seam along the edges, the front does fold up when you sit down or walk a bunch. The fabric is thin enough that I think it’ll remain invisible under normal fabric, but with this particular dress, you can see it if you really look.

Further, the back isn’t quite long enough to have enough volume for my butt. So it’s very low in back, almost with some plumber’s butt happening. It also doesn’t quite cup under my butt cheeks like the Maidenform boy-shorts do. So by the end of the day, after sitting down and getting up and walking up and down stairs repeatedly, there was a mini-wedgie happening at the base of the panty. The faster I walked and the bigger my strides, the worse it got (which is really fun in a city like New York, where you’re pretty much always power-walking).

Still, I would probably buy these again. I’m still hoping Hanky Panky makes a pair of Bare hipster briefs. As long as there’s enough volume in the butt, that’d be perfection!