It is usually impossible to stay completely wrinkle free all day. The second you sit down in the car and put your seatbelt on, you may feel that it's all over with! However, that is not true. Yes you may be a little less wrinkle free than when you started out, but believe me, ironing those clothes was not a waist of time.
Lets face it. Clothing care takes time. And when you love clothes, you must realize that you need to care for them, not just wear them. When we first purchase something, it looks great because it hasn't been laundered. The color is great, the fabric looks smooth and for some reason we don't seem to always think about the care we have to take of the garment when we are making that initial purchase.
Here are a few ways you can keep your clothes looking great:
1. Take the time to iron your clothes. Even if it is knit top, it could use some touching up.
2. Consider buying a steamer, but don't think that it's going to cure all your wrinkle problems. Cotton shirts and tees look best when actually pressed. A steamer works well with silks and polyester fabrics. A steamer also works well when having to freshen up an item that has been previously worn so that you may not have to wash it so much.
3. Drying your clothes ruins them. You know the lint that collects in the dryer? That's your clothing breaking down and falling apart. The dryer also tends to makes garments take on a pill-y effect. Some garments say that you can tumble dry low. Ignore that and hang or lay flat to dry.
4. Before you iron your clothing use a sticky roller to de-lint the garment so that you don't press the lint into your clothes.
5. I personally hate dry cleaning, but there are certain garments that you really need to have dry cleaned. Those garments would include anything lined especially those made of linen, silk or wool. These fabrics must be dry cleaned in order to prevent the outer layer from shrinking up. I have tried washing these garments in the past and what happens is, the linen, silk or wool shrinks and the polyester lining doesn't therefore causing the lining to hang out of the garment. Not good!
6. Pay attention to labels. Does it say dry clean or dry clean only? If it just says dry clean, then you may be fine to just hand wash it. All of my cashmere says dry clean on the label, however I hand wash them they come out beautiful. If an item says dry clean only, then you must dry clean it.
As you can see, when you love clothes that doesn't mean that you just wear them. It means you must take care of them. You can purchase the best clothing and still look like a wreck if you don't care for them properly.
My favorite irons and steamers are made by Rowenta.
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