What is fabric care?
You’re already in the right place for fabric care, and we guess you’re already in the right mindset. However, for those of you who need a crash course on fabric care, read on!
Our wardrobes are filled with different kinds of fabrics and clothing, each requiring different types and amounts of TLC to avoid common pitfalls like shrinkage, fading, colour bleeding, felting or fabric degradation. Essentially fabric care means taking care of your garments in a way that maintains their quality, appearance, handfeel and durability.
Proper fabric & clothing care is essential to preserve your favourite items of clothing, ensuring that they always look and feel their best whilst maintaining their original look and feel. By doing so, you can also extend the lifecycle of your clothing and make them last for years and years to come.
The Importance of Care Labels
The care label is your go to guide for garments care, which is often overlooked. It’s an easy to find, specifically tailored fabric care guide, providing all the essential instructions for maintaining a garment’s appearance and integrity. It’s crucial to follow these guidelines to extend the lifecycle of your garments and keep them looking like new for longer.
But, in some cases, the care label for those great vintage finds, or well-loved worn forever items can be missing, or washed out. If this is the case having a basic understanding of fabric care becomes essential. If that’s the case, don’t worry! This guide offers expert fabric care insights to ensure your favourite pieces of clothing deserve the care and attention that they truly deserve
How to take care of natural fabrics?
As the name suggests, a natural fabric is the one that’s derived from “nature or natural sources”. Cotton and linen, for example, are crafted from plant fibres, while luxurious fabrics like wool, cashmere, and even silk yarns and textiles originate from animal sources. Once the plants or animal fibres have been processed into yarns, they can be transformed into woven and knitted textiles in endless combinations for clothing or home textiles. Such is the nature of these textiles, they have been cherished for centuries thanks to their amazing characteristics like comfort, breathability, and durability, and are often found at ancient archaeological sites, as well as well-loved family heirlooms pieces and hand me downs.
Cotton
Renowned for its comfort and breathability, cotton is a staple in many modern wardrobes and has been a much-appreciated textile and clothing material for 1000’s of years. However, being a daily wardrobe staple and natural fabric, it requires much gentler care than it usually receives (how many times do we throw our cotton tees into the washing machine without a second thought?).
While machine washable, selecting the best water temperature for cotton laundry is essential. Lukewarm water ranging from 30ºC to 40ºC is suitable. But, for prints or coloured items, using a lower temperature is even better to lock in the richness of colours (and to keep the laundry costs down)
If the laundry to be washed is stained or heavily soiled, warm water washing (40ºC or above) is recommended, but it should be done with caution, and make sure to quickly check the laundry label to avoid any color loss, colour bleeding or fabric shrinkage.
To maintain a crisp appearance, line drying is ideal. But if time is an issue, a spin in a low-heat tumble dryer is a good alternative. As you may already know, cotton is highly prone to wrinkling, a quick iron on a medium-high heat setting ensures a smooth and wrinkle free look. To avoid over-drying (which weakens fabrics and can lead to tearing), it’s best to remove fabrics from the dryer whilst slightly damp.
Whilst Cotton is super durable, and when properly taken care of, can last for a lifetime (or beyond!) it can still use a once in a while moment of TLC. Rather than throwing out those faded, pilled, or worn-out cotton faves, give them a new lease of life with BIORESTORE Re-Tergent.
By using BIORESTORE it’s possible to extend the life of cotton clothing and prevent them from looking shabby and old. Meaning your worn-out cotton tee can be restored to its original glory and rehung in yours (or even someone else’s) wardrobe for a sustainable and smart win-win solution.
Denim
We all have a stack of denim jeans in our wardrobe, from classic Indigo blues to blacks and neutrals. If you’re the type of denim lover that's into the wear and tear and faded look, then maybe this section is not for you. However, if you like to keep the color of your denim crisp and clean, here are some great laundry tips! While denim can be machine-washed, it must be kept away from the wear, tear and heat of tumbling around in the dryer. Flat drying is preferable to maintain its shape (If you use a clothing line, you will need to have well positioned pegs or clips to prevent any misshaping)
In case of stubborn wrinkles, a flat iron can be used on medium-high heat setting, although we suggest leaving the wrinkles in place as they will drop out during wearing.
Of course, we all know that denim can really last “forever’’, however, denim is still prone to premature aging and fading, which of course is something that many of us look for in our denim and jeans. However, for a fresh or renewed look BIORESTORE improves the handfeel, removes pilling, lint and hairiness.
Leather
Whether its fresh from the runway or a well-loved vintage piece, Who doesn’t love flaunting a rich and supple leather jacket? While leather fabric boasts a natural resistance to wear and tear, liquids and stains, thoughtful fabric care is required for any laundry or maintenance. We recommend using a local dry cleaner for any major fabric care.
(Pro Tip: Ask your favorite clothing store which dry cleaners they use for a trusted recommendation)
With that in mind, and always pre-checking the care label, most leather garments can be washed in a machine with cold-water setting with a dedicated leather cleanser. To avoid drying-induced damage, flat air-drying is the ideal and a low-heat iron with no steam can be used (with caution) to get rid of any wrinkles.
To stay on the safe side, keep a protective layer between the iron and the leather. Once washed and dried, consider using a specialist wax conditioner or balm to add moisture, and shine to the surface of the leather.
Silk
Silk, by its delicate nature demands VIP TLC. While some silk fabrics can take machine washing on “gentle” or “delicate” cycle, handwashing with lukewarm water is ideal.
As with leather, it should only be air-dried. Ironing should be done on the lowest heat setting with the garment turned inside out and should be gently pressed with the tip of the iron, particularly across seams. To keep your silks looking like new for longer, it’s essential to store them away from direct sunlight, and add a couple of moth balls or cedar blocks to the wardrobe to prevent moths.
Linen
Linen is a natural fiber crafted from the flax plant, renowned for its exceptional breathability, durability, and refined texture. The cool, and crisp feel of linen makes it a popular choice for warm-weather clothing, bedding, and home textiles.
To preserve the strength and breathability of your linen fabrics, dry-cleaning or handwashing with lukewarm water is ideal. Air-drying is preferable but if you are running short on time, low-heat tumble drying is also acceptable.
While ironing, a low-medium heat setting can be used with a protective barrier in between the iron and the fabric. For the best fabric care, iron the garment inside out when it’s still slightly damp.
PRO TIP: To refresh clothing made of linen between washes, consider hanging it in a steamy bathroom after a hot shower. The moisture will help the fibres to relax and reduce wrinkles.
In this guide, we have outlined the basic clothing care guidelines for most common garments in every wardrobe as we believe all fabrics and clothing items are precious. By following these expert tips, we hope to inspire and educate that with a few additional quick steps your wardrobe can be well cared for with the minimum of effort for maximum results
