January 20, 2010

You call these directions?

I am by no means a fashionista, or anything close to one. So I am reaching out to my fashion knowledgeable friends. Please don't laugh.

One of the things I used to like about clothes is that you always know how to tend to them, take care of them, keep them CLEAN! Dry clean only, hand wash and line dry, tumble dry low, machine wash warm, use cool iron if necessary. The combination is endless.

So imagine my surprise when I read this: Machine wash cold with like colors, line dry in cool place. For best results dry clean.

WHAT?

I feel like if the tag could talk it would say "sure go ahead and try washing your brand new (what I consider nice) pants and line drying them, but when you ruin them you'll realize you should have just dry cleaned them!"

So what do I do....do I attempt to wash them or do I just surrender them to the dry cleaners?

Geez.......

4 comments:

  1. I'm a huge fan of machine washing (on delicate) and then laying them flat to dry. I've learned that because I wear stuff so much, dry cleaning is a pain in the butt! I machine wash everything that says dry clean! :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm with Jamie. I machine wash everything!! If you have a delicate cycle, use it. Plus it's much cheaper than dry cleaning!!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Like Jamie and Shauna, I hate dry cleaning! I will only resort to dry cleaning if it's an expensive garment, has a lot of intricate beading, or is made of a very delicate material. Other than that, they're all going in the washer! I wash a lot of my "dry clean only" clothes on delicate in a lingerie bag (these are available at Walmart are are very inexpensive). It keeps the garments from being wrapped around in the washing machine. After that, I'll just lay the item flat to dry. It may take a good ironing to bring it back to life, but I'd rather do that than go to the dry cleaners any day!

    My mom's rule of thumb that she passed down to me is to check the fabric content. Just about anything made from cotton or polyester can be machine washed, no matter what the label says. Silks are a little tougher, but I usually wash mine anyway.

    Good luck! (and good question) :-)

    ReplyDelete
  4. I'm the opposite! I'm a big fan of dry cleaning. It's expensive and a pain in the rear end but I think you can tell a huge difference in how long your clothes last when you have them dry cleaned vs. washing them yourself. Machine washing, even on a delicate setting, is just a lot harder on clothes and they tend to wear out quicker I've found.

    ReplyDelete

What's that you say?