While she waited to own it, paying it off, Hanley, now a second-year fashion student at RMIT and as near to a professional corsetier as you can get, experimented, making her own corsets from scratch. "They were OK, not so great when I look at them now, but I didn't want to wait. I'd fallen in love with that shape. All these parts of you that you might not really like, suddenly moulded into this lovely, this gorgeous, shape."

This hour-glass. It is the iconic shape of woman: full breasts, narrow waist, wider hips. Out of a fashion market awash with "shape-wear" - virtually high-tech elastic girdles and underpants that suck in, flatten and ostensibly shrink a womanly figure - corsets have emerged like cultural counterpoints, accentuating and celebrating curves, and not only in bridal and evening-wear, fetishist lingerie and gothic costume either. Corsets have gone mainstream.

"They're for people who like to look like people, more than people who look like grasshoppers," states corset lover Janet Coath, 22, a student of martial arts, part-time bookshop staffer, and owner of "seven or eight" bespoke, couture corsets. So far. "My first ever was blood red velvet," she reminisced. "It felt fantastic; it hugs you. I was addicted from that moment." Coath's corsetier is Carly Van Groeningen, 21, also a student, but as involved in corset making and design techniques as her studies in natural therapies.

"I love corsets because they are more of a challenge, more unique, and require precise measurements and a lot of fine work." They also meld well with her dramatic clothing designs, elegantly cinching the volume of one trumpet-sleeved satin gown, for example, pushing Janet Coath's figure into a compelling, almost cartoonishly beautiful picture. Van Groeningen took private corset-making lessons but, like Hanley and others who are reviving an art crushed by a century of bad press, she has had to rely more on trial and error to perfect her techniques.

"We learnt together," she said of her teacher. "There are some costume design courses that teach some corsetry, but they're hard to find. And it's quite hard anyway; you have to know how to use the right sort of boning, how to shape and finish, what corset suits what person and what they'll be doing." The rarity of corsetiers means most corsets are still bought off-the-rack and online from companies geared to sexy and fetish lingerie. But that market is changing, too. Carol White of Corsets.com.au has done brisk business in her sexy and mostly imported American ready-to-wear corsets for three years. But increasing demand for corsets suitable for wear with mainstream fashion, evening and bridal wear recently persuaded her to launch a new brand with business partner Rebecca Wood. "Miss Kitty Couture will suit new styles of dresses," says White, "or they can be worn on their own." Because the Miss Kitty Couture collection, due for launch in March, is off-the-rack, prices are comparatively cheap at $125 to $195. With a professional fitting (White and Wood have a retail outlet called Naughty Butt Nice in Newport, staffed by expert fitters), White adds, that an off-the-rack corset is good value for money compared with a custom-made design.

For some corset connoisseurs, however, anything less than an haute couture version is still unthinkable. They believe that the perfect, personalised design is only possible in the process that begins with an idea, teased out between client and corsetier. It's a process that can take a couple of days and one or two fittings, or up to three weeks and four fittings, depending on how elaborate the corset, how finicky the client and how busy the corsetier. There are three basic corset styles: full corset (over-bust), under-bust and waist cincher. Prices average $180 to $200 for an haute couture version, up to $400 or more for exceptional corsets, and down to $39 for a lingerie style with synthetic boning. The shape and length, internal structure and finishes vary so infinitely that a bespoke couture corset is not only unique, but innately "yours".

There can be as many as 10 separate sections of stiffened wadding and outer fabric, each shaped, when flat, like a long hour-glass in a classic, full corset. Each section or panel is also "boned", meaning it is separated from the next by spiral steel rods sewn into the structure. These flex: "They curve with your curves, allow you to move from side to side," explains Hanley, to assume the hourglass shape when a corset is laced. Up to 20 bones can be incorporated in a single corset. In cheaper, off-the-rack styles, these are often plastic and serviceable enough, but unlikely to maintain their shape for as long as steel. In corset hierarchy, plastic ranks the lowest. In a classic corset, on the other hand, rigid, flat steel "bones" form a busk at the front or back or both, and force the stiffening, lengthening and straightening effect on the wearer's spine. "They are, simply, fantastic for your posture," Coath says.

"And not uncomfortable to wear. I can wear a corset for 12 hours, easily." There are devotees, however, whose passion evolves into obsession, and recalls corsets' occasionally ugly Victorian history. "Waist training" is a technique some women use to shrink their measurements over time. "I don't do it, but I know some who do," Coath says.

"It needs to be done very carefully, or it can damage ribs and internal organs." Waist training is also a chore for the particularly dedicated: "They have to eat, sleep, work in them," says Coath of the under-bust corsets or waist cinchers, designed to be laced tighter and tighter every day until a waist as tiny as 41 centimetres can be achieved.

"It does seem that waist training is coming back," said Van Groeningen, "But it's not good for you. Most people wear a corset on special occasions, or for going out; being able to see that proper, hourglass curve. That's enough. That's a rarity these days. There's no need to overdo it." CORSETRY: Melinda Hanley meets and measures clients of her Defence Mechanism label at her Oakleigh studio or by arrangement at their home or office. Phone 0401 212 934, or visit http://www.myspace.com/defencemechanismbymellie

Carly van Groeningen works out of her Lyris Design, Ringwood studio, and by appointment at client's address. Phone 0437 363 489 or visit http://www.pearlsilks.net/lyrisdesign/ Carol White and Rebecca Wood will launch their own corset line, Miss Kitty Couture, for sizes 6 to 24 on http://www.corsets.com.au and at Nice Butt Naughty, 443 Melbourne Road, Newport, 1300 138 876.

Dee-Arne McVeigh and Janice Bell of Waisted Corsetry, specialise in leather corsets, sizes 6 to 32, priced from $250 to $400, 0427 335 463, or 0406 182 230, http://www.waistedcorsets.com. Victorian Gothic offers off-the-rack and made-to-measure corsets at 141 Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, 9416 1777. An enormous range of corsets are also available online at corsetry.com.au, debras.com.au, sandra-dee.com.au, winklingerie.com.au and others.

At aussiecorsetsupplies.com.au, the components of classic corsetry are also available, including steel spiral boning, flat steel boning, busks, grommits, bone tapes and casing, steel bone tips and corset patterns.