If you are like most people, you love new clothes. They fit well, the colors are bright, and they make you feel good! You proudly wear them with their newness bringing you great joy and then you give them their first wash. You hurry to the dryer and they come out looking like something that you have been wearing around the house for 10 years. Faded colors, tight spots, and just worn-looking. What? But you just bought it yesterday! Sound familiar? If you want to know how to make your clothes last longer and look like you just pulled them off of the store shelves, then this post is for you!
Read the Labels
The best and easiest advice to give to keep your clothes looking new is to read the labels on your clothes… And do what they say! The little bit of time it takes to read the labels can make the difference between a piece of clothing that still fits you and one that you can barely squeeze a leg into. Definitely see if something is washable or needs to be dry-cleaned.
While the labels tell you what temperature of water the item should be washed in, they also say how to dry and iron the clothes. Some say to dry on low heat or to line dry, or even to lay flat to dry. These details are important to extend the life of your clothes and to keep them looking their best. No one wants a wrinkled or burnt piece of clothing because you failed to follow the instructions! Check out this article for a fantastic list of iron settings and material types.
Use the right temperature
Using the right temperature during the wash cycle is important for keeping your clothes looking new. Using too hot of water can not only shrink your clothes, but it can also easily fade your colors making them look like they are worn out and several years old. If you want your clothes to last longer, use a warm or cold wash because hot water can loosen the fabric of your material making your clothes more susceptible to tears and holes or just getting worn out before their time.
Pre-treat Stains
Promptly treating an item that has food spilled on it is your best bet for saving that favorite piece of clothing. While The Dutchman’s Laundry has some heavy-duty laundry equipment, it is always best to treat the soiled area with a stain remover before the stain gets set in, and, if necessary, soak right away if you’re not sure what to do. Tide pens are great to have on hand for when you are not at home and easy to have in your purse or glove compartment in the car. There is nothing worse than having to throw away a new shirt simply because you spilled coffee on it and never got around to treating the stains.
Separate your laundry
Keeping your whites, white and your darks, dark seems so easy to do, but it can be a difficult challenge to accomplish. Separating the white laundry from the colored laundry is vital to maintaining true whites. Washing whites with a bit of bleach helps to ensure that they maintain their brightness and using hot water on most cotton whites helps to get rid of any stain-causing body oils. You might want to consider hanging your whites outside to dry on a sunny day to let the sunshine naturally bleach your clothes for you. For some tips on bleaching your laundry naturally with lemon juice, read this short post.
When washing colored laundry use cold water and a gentle detergent that won’t fade your colors. You might even want to consider using a gentle wash cycle so your clothes don’t get beaten around so hard that it causes the clothes to look faded.
Separate the denim and work clothes out from the other colored clothes so your slacks and shirts don’t get snagged on rough zippers or possibly stained from newer denim. It would be a good idea to wash a load of denim, a load of good coloreds, and a load of everyday colored clothes.
Let someone else do it!
Sound like to much work? Use our professional drop off laundry service! Let us take the hassle out of laundry day for you! We separate out your clothes for you and wash according to your instructions. You get to select what detergent and softener you would like us to use and we can add in bleach if requested. We dry your laundry and return it to you neatly folded. How’s that for a hassle-free laundry day?
Contact The Dutchman’s Laundry in Clarksville, TN for more information!
