How to care for your dress

 

How to care for your garment

And get the most out of it.

 

Care instructions

Machine wash cold, with like colors, on gentle cycle. Line dry.

To maximize the life of your GARMENT, we recommend:

  • Hang your item in a well ventilated area when not in use.

  • Washing your garment as little as possible. If you notice any area starts to smell, wet with warm water and hang to dry overnight.

  • Wearing only deodorant, not aluminum-based anti-perspirant. Anti-perspirant deodorant combined with sweat can create armpit stains and can make odor difficult to remove from the shirt's armpit area. If you are seeing deodorant build-up on your dress, we recommend using less.

  • Avoiding strong alkaline products—(ie use of homemade deodorant or natural deodorant that contains baking soda, clay, magnesium, zinc or charcoal). We’ve seen this destroy the dress fabric in the armpit area.

  • While we do not endorse and are not affiliated with any of these brands, we have found that many of our customers enjoy these deodorant brands: Nuud, Lume, Dove Refillable, Pit Liquor, and Crystal deodorants.

  • Ironing on low heat, steaming, or hanging the garment in the bathroom while taking a hot shower if your garment is wrinkled. This is a great tip for when traveling and you don’t have a steamer or iron at hand!

Washing Tips

Dry Clean
Typically, when you take a garment to a dry cleaner, they launder it which involves harsh detergents, hot water, and heated drying. When taking your wool& item to the dry cleaners, you’ll need to clarify “dry clean only."

Machine Wash
Check the temperature of your washing machine’s cold cycle. Depending on your location and how the machine was installed, cold cycles can run warm (75+ degrees) which will eventually ruin your merino garment.

Some of our customers prefer to buy natural wool-specific detergent brands, but it’s not required. Most spots can be removed with a tiny amount of water and gentle soap such as castile soap or detergent (or for an oily spot, a dab of diluted dish soap), followed by a good rinse.

We do not recommend letting any detergent or product sit on the fabric for extended periods of time; it’s generally not needed if you treat spots promptly. Don’t use bleach, peroxide based cleansers, or fabric softeners. Don’t use any stain removers (such as OxiClean, Shout, Tide-To-Go pens, Spray’n’Wash, etc).

Remove promptly and shake out for wrinkle-free drying.

Note: we've had a handful of customers experience some issues after using Eucalan wool wash. While we haven't tested this ourselves, we noticed that this product has Ammonium Chloride, which can react similarly to bleach on natural fibers and dyes. For this reason, we recommend an alternate laundry product such as your normal everyday laundry detergent or an alternate wool product such as Laundress, Soak, Kookaburra, Nikwax Woolwash, or a similar product.

Hand Washing
Just what it sounds like. Fill up a sink or container with cold water, add a couple drops of detergent, and throw in your garment. Gently swirl the clothing in the sink for a minute or two. Rinse thoroughly. Instead of wringing dry, lay out a towel, lay garment on top, and roll up the towel with the garment inside while applying pressure. Hang garment in an open area. 

Shrinkage
Even with proper care, you can expect a merino garment to shrink just a little bit, in the realm of 2-3%. This amount is barely noticeable to the wearer.

Drying Tips

Line dry or lay flat to dry. We do not recommend drying in a machine because this may increase shrinkage and decrease the life of your garment.

Mending Resources

Woolmark Mending

Woolmark Care

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