NEW BRAS FOR OLD BOOBS

Redo your old bras and give your budget a lift


Some of us have no budge in our budget these days, so we don't have $50 to spend on fancy lingerie for Valentine's Day.

So we jumped at the chance to score some ideas from DIY doyenne Erica Domesek on how to make over bras we already have in our lingerie drawer.

Domesek is all about creative recycling. She calls it upcycling, or making things over into something more valuable or upscale than they were in their first life.

"I tell people that it's designer DIY," says the professional crafter who lives in New York City. "At the end of the day we want great things, but we don't want to spend tons of money."

She works predominantly behind the scenes with the fashion industry and some of its biggest designers, making jewelry and accessories and embellishing items used in fashion shoots and ads.

"You don't think about it when you see advertisements," she says. "Nobody ever stops to think 'Who made those denim bows? Or those wire sculptures for Anthropologie?' I've always been behind the scenes making things."

She was working at a fashion show when someone complimented her on the necklace she was wearing. "Thanks," she said. "P.S., I made it."

That gave her the name of her DIY Web site " psimadethis.com " and the name of a do-it-yourself fashion book coming out in the fall.

She recently filmed a series of how-to videos for Modelinia.com, a Web site for fashion models. One of the models helping with a video gave her the idea of embellishing bras.

"I'm not someone who goes out spending a lot of money on expensive bras," Domesek says. "However, we started talking about it, and we collectively came up with this idea of how it would be really cool, instead of dressing up the bra, to dress up the straps."

If you dress up the straps, you can show them off under strapless, off-the-shoulder and asymmetrical tops, she says.

Here are three of her ideas:


Modern boho: Glue bits of vintage lace or old lace doilies to the straps in an overlapping fashion. If you don't have old lace, stain new lace in tea. She used hot glue for her projects, but fabric glue holds up better when the bras are handwashed, she says.

Contemporary chic: Hand-sew strands of rhinestones to the straps. "I kind of drizzled them on," she says. You'll find rhinestones at craft stores or online at Web sites such as mjtrim.com, one of her favorite sources for trim.

Rulebreaker: Honestly, this one sounds a little, uh, nutty. Tie a bunch of mini washers and mini hex nuts to the straps using black ribbon or tulle. Says Domesek, who gets her inspiration from everywhere: "I'm like a kid in a candy store at the hardware store."
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DO-IT-YOURSELF GLAMOUR

Erica Domesek inspired us to create our own glammed-up bras for Valentine's Day. You can embellish one you already own, but we bought four $5 bras from Walmart. For inspiration, we turned to four of our favorite fashion-forward women " the characters from "Sex and the City."

The Carrie: We decorated one strap with iron-on flowers to create a corsage effect. Cost: $5.

The Samantha: We glued fabric rhinestone bracelets, which we found in the jewelry department, to the straps and embellished the middle with iron-on studs. Cost: $11.

The Miranda: We used a length of knife-pleated ribbon to add elegance to this red bra. ($4.50)

The Charlotte: This was Domesek's idea: We used strips of tulle to tie strands of plastic, pearl-like Mardi Gras beads to the straps. Cost: $1.50.