Tomima’s Blog – Lingerie & Underwear Expert

I think all of us at one time or another have wondered about the proper sequence of undergarments.  Let’s say you have a pair of pantyhose, a panty, and a piece of shapewear.  In what order do you put them on?  Do you wear all of them or forfeit something?

We posed this question to 13 of our shapewear vendors including Spanx, Bali, BodyWrap, Va Bien and TC Fine.  We were stunned to hear they all had the same response.  It was, forget the panties, put on your pantyhose, and then put on your shapewear.

Are you surprised?  We here in the office were.  For starters, most of us felt panties should be worn.  The reason the manufacturers feel they aren’t necessary is because they all make shapewear with a cotton crotch or an accessible crotch.  Therefore, shapewear is specifically designed to eliminate the need for panties.

I took a poll of the women in our office about this.  The responses fell roughly along age lines.  Our younger crowd agreed about not wearing panties.  Many had tried panties on under their shapewear, but found that the panty created an additional line – even when they tried laser edge cut panties like Commandos.  Our more mature crowd simply likes the idea of panties and wouldn’t consider not wearing them.

The reason pantyhose go on first is because if put on over shapewear, they tend to slide down due to the slick nature of the shapewear fabric.  You can spend the night feeling your pantyhose inching down your body and finding yourself in the ladies room several times in order to pull them back up. The panthose can also cause a line that otherwise would be smoothed out if shapewear was put on over it.  Now, that said, there are several shapewear pieces that have silicone gripper tape along the legs to keep the shapewear in place. Putting this gripper tape on top of pantyhose renders it worthless, and could possibly cause a run in the pantyhose.  So, there can be some conflicting results in this situation.

Personally, this is what I do.  I don’t wear panties.  I also don’t wear pantyhose.  If I want leg covering, I buy thigh-high stockings.  Since my shapewear of preference is a biker short style, I first put on my thigh-highs, pull up my shapewear, and make sure the top of my stockings are secured by my shapewear.  Now, I really only have one layer on, I’m comfortable, not hot, and have a very simple solution when I need to visit the ladies room.

Does anyone have any better ideas here?  If so, I hope you’ll post them here in comments.

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