Okay, it’s really this simple—the longer you can keep your clothes looking good the more money you save yourself. Even a fashionista can benefit from proper fabric care. We all know how clothing trends tend to cycle around every few years. Being able to pull something retro out your closet can be a true game-changer.
Maybe it’s as simple as trying to avoid losing a favorite garment that you wear more than most others. Regardless of your reason for wanting to learn more about good fabric care practices, you’ve made the right decision, especially for those who require petite or plus size womens wear since retailers typically keep little to no stock available in-store.
Here are five very effective and easy ways you can assure you get the most out of every piece of clothing you own. Once you see how quick and easy fabric care can be don’t be surprised if you find yourself helping family and friends with their laundry too.
Give Your Fabric That Little Extra Care It Needs
In today’s world where social media and fashion go hand in hand, everybody wants to look their best all the time. And they should but you should never need to compare yourself to anybody else but you. One Frugal Girl has a great blog on this topic you can read by clicking on the hyperlink. Nevertheless, we can’t help ourselves sometimes which is fine and healthy. We all deserve to be able to look and feel our best all the time—no exceptions.
What we wear plays a big part in how we feel and view ourselves. Money, time, or pure laziness can sometimes be the reason why we don’t take proper care of our fabrics. In turn, forcing us to either spend money on new garments or settle for the ones you already own. But money doesn’t grow on trees and maybe you really like that old dress you bought a few years back too much to give up on it.
Treat Your Delicates Delicately
It can be a very smart move to invest in some sort of lingerie or underwear laundry bag. For bras and panties, clipping them together can even work. These garments are more fragile than others and may need to be washed separately and hung to dry. Doing this will ensure their look as well as their fit and life span.
Enjoy the Outdoors—Hang to Dry
Utilizing your dryer does make things a lot easier and faster but it can also cause a lot of damage to your fabrics. Causing tiny microtears that in time get larger ruining your fabric. Even if you put your dryer in a low tumble cycle, hanging to dry is still better and healthier for your fabrics. You will also avoid unwanted shrinkage from staying away from the dryer.
Sort and Separate
I know sorting and separating your clothes is not fun and it takes up valuable time. Maybe using two small laundry baskets instead of one could help. This will make it easy to separate your whites from colors. You can even go a step further and separate by fabric type to get an even better result when caring for your fabrics.
Learn Your Washing Machine
Hand washing, regardless of how annoying a task it is, truly is the best way to wash most fabrics. But who really has the time or energy to perform such a task? Therefore, it’s important to know what cycle and detergents to use while using your washing machine. Typically washing in a delicate setting using cold or lukewarm water works best.
Keep Up With Your Laundry
This step is not always easy to accomplish, but it’s a must. While you don’t want to be doing laundry every time you wear an outfit, you should do it once a week. Let the clothes pile up and use your new separation techniques. Only wash when you have a load or two ready to go. Do, however, treat stains immediately, if possible, even if you don’t wash them right away. You don’t want to be so backed up on laundry that you skip all your fabric care steps due to feeling overwhelmed. Believe me, it does happen, all the time.