Mark, that sounds like a great article! I'm excited to see it.

Hi ceciled,
When you say that the wires in shop bras end up in your armpits, this is what I mean about classic bra cups being cut for a cone shape, the cone gets bigger as you go up in size and so dos the underwire. So the cone may hold the breast volume but the base of the cone is too big for the breast root, were the wire should sit. Instead the cup volume should increase but the base should only increase slightly i.e. curve the sides of the cone to increase volume, making it more spheroid. Yes its 3-D engineering (and thinking) that’s one of the reasons I love designing and trying to closely fit garments to the wonderful curves all you lady’s have.
It’s a pity that the industry is more about profit, banging out ill fitting bras cut from 30 - 40 year old patterns (and ideas) than updating the size / shape by doing some research!

Well if cones were still in fashion we'd all be alright to a point, no pun intended lol. I did read on a pattern drafting site that went over the bra block about the issue of breast volume and shape versus the shape of the cup. There was also a table of different breast shapes within a circle which was interesting and illustrated well the problem of unrealistic shapes that manufactures make versus a woman's natural curve. How and where on the block would I add volume without creating an extreme conical shape? And should I reduce the width of the underwire so I am closer to my root? Why I thought about forgoing the underwires all together.

As my rather hasty graphic hopefully demonstrates, you want to curve out the sides of the cups to create a globe shape out of your triangular (cone-producing) pieces. The base of the shape (the underwire, blue in my image) stays the same length. So does the length from base to point (purple), though the seam is longer in the spherical version, the shape of the seam keeps the point at pretty much the same distance from the base/chest wall. What does grow, and what you want to grow, is the measurement around the middle of the two shapes (red and green, respectively). That's where the extra volume comes from! If your cups are holding your total breast volume very well right now, you may find when you make this change that the total volume is too big. In that case, make the whole shape shorter (bring the point/apex closer to the base) without making the lines less curvy.

Thank you for the diagram. I have tried to shorten in the past but it was with a ready made pattern and not something I drafted myself and couldn't get it right. But with my own draft it'll probably work. I'm going to make some prototypes and see what happens. I'm guessing it'll help to add an extra layer of non stretch in the bottom cups so as to aid with lift. I'm learning a lot from Mark's articles and hope to fix these issues. I've also started to hate pre made bras because I can identify everything about them I don't like or want. I'm hoping once I master the bra that I can help family and friends with their fitting issues. Thank you.

I'm glad that was helpful! You could have a look at the 'sling bra' article, which is all about providing lift. There are some down-sides, depending on how you do it, but it might help.