You spent innumerable hours perusing wedding dress catalogs, boutiques, and the internet searching for your ideal wedding dress. Countless attempts were made while trying on a variety of gowns, to be whittled down to your absolute favorite. Then came tailoring the gown to perfection. Your wedding dress is the most important item of clothing you’ll own in your lifetime. By preserving your gown, you are giving it the opportunity to be passed down to a loved one in the future, or maybe you’d like to keep it as a memento. Many stains that appear invisible on your big day may actually brown with age over time. This is why hiring a professional to preserve your dress is the best way to ensure that it remains in pristine condition for years to come.
Find A Cleaner That Uses Virgin Solvents
The most important thing to look for in a wedding dress preservation professional is the use of virgin solvent. Many cleaners, because of ecological regulations, will reuse their solvent for the cleaning process. By finding a cleaner who uses new solvent every time, you will avoid a lingering dry clean smell and impurities being deposited onto your garment. A reputable cleaner will always use new solvent on wedding dresses.
Choose The Best Method
Wet Cleaning
This method of cleaning uses water to remove sugar stains, and food stains, and dirt from the hem of the dress more effectively than other cleaning techniques . If the fabric has been thoroughly rinsed after using this method, it leaves the fabric the cleanest when compared with other methods. Another benefit of wet cleaning is the removal of fabric sizing, which is a starch-like substance which holds the form of the dress. This is helpful because fabric sizing is attractive to mice and insects, which may destroy a dress that’s in storage!
Dry Cleaning
Dry cleaning is done with solvents that dissolve stains and residue on your gown. Nowadays, environmental regulations are restricting the use of perchloroethylene, the most common petroleum-based solvent. It is being replaced with greener products. Despite environmental concerns, perchloroethylene is the most effective solvent choice for cleaning heavily soiled rayon, silk, and acetate. However, this solvent is very harsh and will melt sequins, beading, and glue on your dress. A knowledgeable dry cleaner will know how to protect your gowns detail work if you decide that perchloroethylene is your best option.
Stoddard solvent is another solvent with a petroleum base. It is much gentler on beads and sequins than perchloroethylene, and does not melt glue. It is more difficult to find however, because of recently enacted environmental regulations.
Exxon-DF 2000 is a petroleum-derived solvent that, like the Stoddard solvent, is gentle on beading and sequin detail work. It is not as effective for decreasing as perchloroethylene or Stoddard solvent.
Greenearth, like Exxon-DF is very gentle on detail work. However, this silicon-based, environmentally friendly solvent is not as effective at removing grease.
Other Considerations
Use Petroleum-Based Solvents when Necessary
Some wedding gowns come with a dry-cleaning label that specifies which types of solvent will clean it the best. If your cleaning label states: dry clean only with petroleum based solvent, then your best solvent options are perchloroethylene, Stoddard, and Exxon-DF 2000.
Considerations for Silk Dresses
The most important consideration for wedding dresses made from silk is how experienced the dry cleaner is. Stain removal and pressing silk fabric is quite difficult, so you’ll want to find someone who has had a lot of past success with preserving silk dresses.
Know How to Properly Store your Dress After Cleaning
The biggest mistake you can make after spending time and money trying to preserve your dress is to store it improperly! Plastic bags are one of the leading causes of gown yellowing, even after careful preservation. To avoid the yellowing fumes that plastic releases, be sure to store your dress in an acid-free bag or box.
We hope this guide has been helpful with deciding which method of gown preservation is right for your special dress. Remember, properly preserving your gown soon after your wedding day is the best way to ensure that it will remain beautiful for years to come. Also, feel free to read our published blog post to learn more about how to preserve your beautiful wedding gown.
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