Adventures in Showgirl: Curvy Kate's "Thrill Me" and "Tease Me"

I already positively reviewed Curvy Kate’s Tease Me bra, but since I owned it in the rather outdated size of 30H, I decided to update my collection recently with a couple of 28Js—two Tease Mes and a Thrill Me. The past-season colorways are still available for good prices on Brastop and Lovebras, plus if you’re in the UK you can find them in certain sizes on Amazon for good prices.

The fit is pretty similar between the two styles of bra, but to be honest I have always had a bit more trouble fitting into the Thrill Me (the one with ruffles). It doesn’t exactly run smaller, this is down to very subtle differences in shape, and most people who have tried both seem to have one or the other that they prefer.

With both these Showgirl styles, I always find it a bit of a wiggle to fit into it at first. Most people like to size up in Showgirl, but since I already wear the biggest size in this range, I can’t. Plus, after a few days’ wear, these bras seem to loosen up a bit and fit me better. However, I still do need to re-adjust a couple times a day. The reason I put up with that is the superior shape offered by the construction of the cup. They are fairly low-cut bras, but with a much higher gore than plunge bras like the Freya Deco, so it’s a balance that I love—they show more skin, but less cleavage. (Still more cleavage than I get in my normal unpadded bras, don’t get me wrong, just not as much as I get in the Deco.)

One hilarious and depressing thing I discovered this winter was the fact that when it’s cold and windy, my boobs go numb (which HURTS) unless I wear a padded bra. So I bought these Showgirl bras to wear as normal, everyday bras, and they do work for that—depending on the clothes you wear them with. The Thrill Me, since it has ruffles, is only suitable for wear under a double layer of tight clothes (ie cami and stretchy top) or something tight and thick-knit like a form-fitting sweater. I also personally wouldn’t wear the Tease Me under anything other than a double layer of tight clothes, just because A. that’s really all I wear and B. because my boobs are full on top, I like to have something holding me down where these bras don’t cover.

I LOVE the back bands on these bras. This is a big deal for me; I hate the back band on every other bra I own! The bands on the Showgirls have a firm stretch all over—they don’t have that pesky tighter strip of elastic, enemy of back fat, on the bottom of the band. A lot of people find that they prefer to go down a band size in Showgirl bras to get a firmer fit, but I’ve never found this. I think the reason it works for me in my normal band size is that it’s a little wider (3 hooks, yay!) and situated a tiny bit lower on the cups than many other bras, so it sits a bit lower on my back, where my ribs are. My ribs are a little bigger than my underbust, so the 28 band works well for me even if it is a tiny bit more stretchy than your normal band. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend that people go down a band size; I’d say only if you’re between sizes or like a really tight band. I would, however, recommend that you try going up a cup size if your boobs are full on the bottom—there is very little volume in the bottom section of these cups.

Now, when I got my ivory/black Thrill Me from Amazon, it wasn’t exactly the most perfect bra I’ve ever seen. Notice anything odd?

The ribbon was missing from one side! At first I planned to return it as faulty, but it had been the last one available in my size, it was very cheap, plus I realized if I sent it back they would probably just throw it out. So I decided to just put in a ribbon and sew it into the corners. I actually used the ribbon from the long bow on my worn-out ivory Panache Confetti, since it was the right color and width.

This wasn’t the only issue with my Thrill Me, though. As a much older colorway, the ivory/black is fabled to run almost a cup size larger than other colorways made at the same time. This manifested itself in an odd way—I got a lot of gaping, something that has never happened to me before.

But I figured this would be an easy fix, too—the ribbons going across the cups (one of which I had just added) simply needed to be tightened a bit. I just pulled them a bit tighter, folded them at the upper corner, and stitched the fold into place.

And voila! The gaping was much improved.

I still feel, in general, that this specific Thrill Me (perhaps the colorway, or perhaps just this one lonely faulty one I happen to own) isn’t as reliable as my Tease Mes. The Tease Me lacks the ruffles that makes the Thrill Me a bit tricky to wear, and I find it a bit more basic and workable in general. But BOTH styles suffer from a design flaw—the part of the band that runs under the cups in front has a very sharp, stiff edging, which rolls in toward my body and cuts in horribly, to the point of shooting pains. I eventually decided it wasn’t worth it to put up with this in hopes that it would stop happening once I’d broken in the bras, so I decided to try a quick fix. I simply rolled the edging up and out, so it folds towards the outside, and stitched it in place. I imagine if I’d spend a bit more time, I could have made this look a bit nicer than the sloppy way I did it…

But hey, compare the before…

…to the after!

The sharp edging is now nowhere near my skin and the bras are wearable.

Now, it may sound like I’ve had to do so much work on these bras that they aren’t worth buying. But don’t worry! All of these alterations were quick fixes, took less than ten minutes, didn’t require any materials other than needle and thread, and can be easily undone with no damage to the bra if I should decide to re-sell them used later (unlike my alterations on the Princess). Plus, the fix I did on the edging under the cups is something that not everyone will need to do, as not everyone has a problem with the edging rolling in towards them. It just depends on your body and how you move. But it is a very easy fix for anyone who loves the Thrill Me/Tease Me and wants to make it a bit more wearable for everyday.

One last note, I wanted to try to show you what the true color of the Silver/Back Tease Me is. It's another of those bras that seems to look different in every photo (sometimes it's indistinguishable from the Lemon/Black, the Almond/Black, or even the Pink/Black). This was my best attempt to capture the color on camera, but it's still less pink-toned than this in real life--more gray than shiny silver, which is what I'd wanted. You can also see that the alteration, even though I did it a bit haphazardly, isn't very noticeable when you see the whole bra!