In good shape

If there were a modern-day patron saint of corsetry it would have to be Madonna.

Back in 1988 when she first appeared on stage in a corset complete with saucy conicle-shaped cups, she helped to place the spotlight firmly on back-laced foundation wear.

Instead of being something you would conceal or confine to the bedroom, Madonna turned corsets into high fashion - and suddenly everyone wanted one.

Now if you go to any function on a Saturday evening you will spot your fair share of corsets - and the chances are a great many of those will be Voller corsets from Hampshire.

Ian Voller, whose family firm has been making corsets for more than 100 years, has seen his business expand by 800 per cent in recent years.

There has always been big money in corsets - especially back at the turn of the 19th century when they formed the staple part of every woman's undergarments.

But since the 1990s there has been a revival of interest and he has seen a major increase in worldwide sales of the famous Voller corset.

"There has always been an interest in corsets but Madonna was responsible for creating a whole new audience for us.

"And programmes like Pride and Prejudice helped to generate more interest too," he said.

Designers such as Thierry Mugler and Vivienne Westwood have also popularised the curve-inducing underwear - and helped make it acceptable as outer-wear.

An on-line flick through Voller's clever website catalogue is proof that corsets have kept up with the latest fashion trend.

Ian's wife Corina is responsible for the latest designs but the firm's success is underpinned by the corsets created by his great-grandfather, Harry.

"My great-grandfather and great-grandmother Harry and Nelly set up the business in 1899.

"They started off in their single-fronted house in Kingston Road, Portsmouth.

"In 1905 Nelly produced her own corset company under the name of Madam Voller, and the company moved across the street to a larger shop complete with a first-floor factory area," he said.

At one time 7,000 women were employed in the trade in Portsmouth and it was known as the capital of corset-making.

"The city's naval connections meant that most of the men were away from the city and sometimes they would be at sea for years at a time - leaving lots of women with time on their hands.

"All the big names in corset making were here but now we are the only ones left - and we are probably the oldest established corset makers in the world today.

"My great-grandfather handed the business down to my grandfather and he handed it on to my father and uncle.

"They worked together and then after World War II, when my father came back, he took over the shop and my uncle ran the factory.

"I worked with my father in the shop and my wife came down from London where she had been working for a textile design company and she ended up helping my uncle.

"Eventually he became very ill with a tumour on the brain and he was unable to continue.

"He had run it as a retirement business with six machinists working on just three days a week.

"In 1991 we took it over. All our friends thought we were mad, they couldn't understand what we were doing getting involved in a factory producing corsets," he said.

But since the nineties Ian has seen the business steadily grow and now up to 30 people are employed making the steel-boned garments.

The Voller shop in Portsmouth has closed and Ian now supplies the likes of Selfridges and Rigby & Peller.

The Internet has opened up a whole new market place for the company and they receive orders from all over the world.

"We supply Figleaves - the largest on-line lingerie company in the UK - and we also sell well to America and Europe.

"All sorts of people buy them - our largest market is the 18 to 25-year-olds.

"They used to say that wearing corsets made women faint but I think they probably collapsed because of the heat or the weight of the clothes they were wearing.

"Having said that, you did hear about women having their bottom rib removed so they could make their waist even smaller.

"But no one goes to those extremes now," he said.

With new designs and materials being incorporated all the time, the future for Voller's is looking rosy.

"We are just about to team up with a top wedding dress design company so that will be an exciting new departure for us.

"I hope there will always be a place for corsets - we have been going for more than 100 years so I don't see why we shouldn't continue for a long while yet," he said.