Why there is a bow at the front of your bra

Women have been bowled over by the explanation for bows on women's undies that has recently come to light.

So, it wasn't long until people were asking what the bow on the front of bras symbolises.

And the internet has done it again with someone responding to a question posted on the social question-and-answer website, Quora.

The response came after a user asked the simple question "Why is there frequently a little bow tie on women's lingerie?"

"In olden days when women wore corsets, there was a piece of whalebone called a busk," one knowledgeable person explained.

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"It was inserted in a sheath down the front of the corset and tied in place with a bow. The busk is gone but the bow remains".

Of course. It makes so much more sense now.

And this explanation brings the lingerie in line with undies, which it turns out, also needed a ribbon tied in a bow to hold the material in place, in the days before elastic was invented.

"It comes from pre-elastic days when your underthings were held in place by a bit of ribbon threaded through the eyelet lace at the tops," one user wrote in response to a question on Reddit.

"The little bow is where you tied that ribbon, and of course, it's in the front because that's the easiest place to do something like that."

So, while today the little bows are purely decorative these days they pay homage to a time when women didn't have it quite so easy.