Designers are good at sketching and creating incredible designs on paper, but their brand failed, why? Because designs couldn't be translated into actual clothing samples, they experimented with different sizes, fabrics, cuts, and repairs, only to burn through all their savings when the opportunity arose to launch a swimsuit line. To prevent designs from being lost in translation during the sampling process, it is important to maintain a good relationship with your swimsuit supplier. Suppliers understand the best production materials for your production line and make recommendations that fit your brand's needs.

When you are designing your own swimsuit, color fastness is the most important consideration. Fastness is a term used to measure how quickly a fabric fades due to factors such as washing, sunlight, chlorine, etc. A swimsuit brand needs good color fastness so that the suit doesn't fade, look worn and get tossed in the trash. Bikinis are typically worn at the beach or pool, where sun, sand, sweat, and many other factors break down and wear them out quickly. Sunlight, salt, and chlorine can also speed up the fading process. These environmental factors not only affect the color and beauty of the fabric, but also its strength and integrity. However, since it is illegal to produce products that do not meet the quality level, all fabrics in Italy meet certain dyeing standards, and if a fabric comes from Italy, it is almost guaranteed to have good color fastness.

When it comes to choosing fabrics with good stretch and performance, many brands think the answer lies in the care labels inside the clothes, but these labels don’t tell the whole truth. The quality of a fabric depends not only on the quality of the yarn in the fabric, but also by how the supplier combines them to design better fabrics reflects the supplier's expertise. Fabric quality and compression should also be taken into consideration, heavier and stronger is not always better, younger customers tend to prefer lighter fabrics while older customers tend to prefer heavier fabrics with more compression (stretch).

The elasticity of clothing determines the success or failure of the product. Swimsuits almost always use elastic bands on their seams. Also, you want to make sure you use elastic that is stretchy and comfortable. When cheaper, stiffer elastic is used to cut costs, it can dig into the wearer's skin, making it very uncomfortable. Different parts of the garment may also require different elastic, for example the elastic in the neck tie of a custom bikini needs to be different than the elastic in the legs, the neck needs more strength to hold the swimsuit in place and the legs need more elasticity to be comfortable. Elastane/spandex is considered a comfort fiber because it allows movement and flexibility. More important than stretching is actually recovery, as a swimsuit keeps stretching and becoming saggy over time, you don't want it to retain its shape.

Armed with the above knowledge, now you can start preparing!