EMBELISHED!
It is all about the bling. Embellished dresses, skirts, pants tops and more take on a new look with mixed metals, gold, sequins, and beading. Intermixed details as you see below, such as chains, various sizing and mixed metals make these looks POP! Accentuate your embellished look with minimal or complimentary accessories to not look over-done. This trend can work for the office but is stylish for a night on the town, gala, or big event. Although beautiful to wear, many of us shy away from such garments because of the special care they require. Many times these embellished articles of clothing don’t include special-care instructions for washing if the embellishments. Discover tips for safely caring for embellished clothing including how to wash, iron and store these clothing gems for long-lasting fashion.
Determining Fabric and Embellishment
The first consideration when washing embellished clothing is the type of fabric. Each type of material will have a different washing method.
Next, look at what the embellishment is and how it was applied. For instance, clothing can be embellished with gemstone beads, feathers, sequins, Swarovski crystal beads, rhinestones and more. Embellishments can be applied in any combination of methods that include jewelry-making adhesives and glues, sewing, rivets or pronged ring settings. Oftentimes just turning the garment inside out will allow you to see the stitching, settings or small glue dots that may not be visible on the outside of the garment. If the garment is lined, you can feel the reverse side through the lining with your fingers to determine what application method was used.
Washing Embellished Garments
We would recommend washing embellished garments inside out on a gentle cycle and tumbling dry on low. However, this machine method may loosen beads on embellished clothing, causing fine materials to snag and beads and crystals to lose their sparkle.
Typically, embellished clothing should be hand washed or sent to a dry cleaner to safely clean them. You will have more control if you wash the item yourself, by hand, inside out using warm water and a small amount of mild liquid detergent. Here are some tips for washing embellished clothing:
Avoid using hot water because this may shrink your fabric, soften adhesives or ruin the finish on beads.
Do not soak for more than a few minutes in order to protect the finish on your beads.
Gently knead and swirl the saturated embellished garment in the sink to remove light soiling.
For larger embellished garments, you may want to use a bathtub to make rinsing easier.
Do not twist or wring the embellished garment, especially with sewn embellishments.
Special care must be taken not to stretch, twist or wring the fabric while washing, rinsing or drying because the tiny threads used to sew on the beads could break and you will lose portions of your beaded design. When the embellished garment is clean, drain the water and press your hands down onto the wadded garment to press most of the water out. There will still be a large amount of water in it, but a clever alternative to a lengthy drying time is to transfer a washed embellished garment to an empty washing machine and use the gentle spin cycle to remove excess water. Do not do this with velvet, because it can cause permanent creases in the pile.