Activewear for the Beach: Sun Lover Bikini Top and Bottom

You might be thinking that I got the seasons mixed up posting about a bikini set in December… To tell the truth, it took me a while to finish my first ever bikini set and blog about it 🙂 Also, the sea season continues well into autumn and winter for me. In fact, I love going to the beach during this time. I feel the presence of nature; the wind and icy water make me alive. I also go to the beach in summer but the feeling is not like putting on my wetsuit and leaving the house.

I was never really interested in sewing a bikini set before. I started looking for one where I would feel comfortable enough to move, to surf—in short being active. I could not really find what I was looking for in the stores and decided to try making one for myself. I wanted a top that has the support of a sports’ bra and I came across the Women’s Sun Lover Bikini pattern in the internet.

Pattern for Bikini Top: Women’s Sun Lover Bikini pattern from Swim Style Size 12.

Pattern for Bikini Bottom: I traced an old bikini that I have at home. I did not use the bottom of the Sun Lover pattern. But I did use the instructions when sewing the bikini which were really helpful.

Materials: Black and green swimwear lycra fabric bought from a store on Nahalat Binyamin street in Tel Aviv. Also, some elastic for binding and bra cups.

Overall, this pattern gives a professional looking bikini top and bottom that are comfortable to wear. However, it took me a while to make it and I made some mistakes during the process. First of all, my elastic was a bit more than 1 cm wide and this made binding in the back really difficult as I was left with very little fabric when I tried to close the bindings from the wrong side. So next time I will pay attention to the width of the elastic. It makes a huge difference even when the elastic is only 3 mm wider. Secondly, for the top part of the bikini, I wanted to make the zigzag stitches in a contrasting color but it showed any little mistake that I did. So I unstitched parts of it many times which took a lot of patience and time. That’s why I did the zigzags of the bottom the same color as the binding fabric.