Preserving your clothing tags may be one of the most important things you can do when it comes to caring for your garments. It's not always as simple as distinguishing between dry or wet wash. Nuances in clothing care such as wash cycle, water temperature, iron or non-iron can be hard to keep track of without the trusty label for recommended care.

Different colors, different care

The first rule of laundry is to check the care label, and the second rule is to always separate your darks and lights.

While most clothing can tolerate warm water, dark or bright fabrics work best with cold water to prevent color transference. The label will state "Do Not Bleach" if the garment can't withstand bleach products or "Non-Chlorine Bleach When Needed" if only certain types of bleach can be used.

At Rinse, we follow these rules for each and every order. Your clothes are properly sorted and expertly cleaned when in our care. If you don’t want to deal with rules one and two yourself, the third rule of laundry is to have someone else take care of your laundry for you. That’s where Rinse comes in! We’ll pick up, expertly clean, and hand-deliver your laundry straight to your door, 7 days a week.

Wet wash or dry clean only

Unless a clothing label reads "Dry Clean Only," the item can most likely be hand washed with an ultra-gentle detergent designed for delicate fabrics.

Special care items such as outerwear, certain textiles such as merino wool, and delicate embellishments or silk fabrics are better left to a trusted dry cleaning service (especially if the label recommends "Professional Dry Clean Only").

Caring for upscale fabrics

More delicate pieces will often have the following instructions: "Machine Wash, Gentle or Delicate" and "Tumble Dry, Low Heat." This means setting your machine to the lowest setting for gentle care at a maximum of 86 degrees Fahrenheit (compared with a fabric like cotton that can withstand 200 degrees). Alternatively, if your dryer does not have a low heat setting, opt to hang dry your item instead. For more refined fabrics such as pure silk, consider using professional laundry services.

For best results: Treat your clothes to a gentle cycle, or hand wash, and always use cold water (below 85 degrees Fahrenheit). To hand wash, simply fill a basin with cold water and add a gentle detergent. Besides investing in a gentle laundry soap for your most treasured pieces, laundry nets are also a fuss-free way to provide an extra layer of protection for washable items.

After-care: to tumble dry or not to tumble dry?

Have you ever shrunk your favorite sweater? Most likely you've forgotten to read the fine print: "Do Not Tumble Dry." Be sure to check the label for instructions on how to dry or press your garments. Basic items such as cotton should be safe in the dryer on a medium setting ("Tumble Dry, Normal"). Clothing with sensitive fabrics might have a "Do Not Iron" warning.

For best results: Even though the label might read "Tumble Dry, Gentle,"—remember, the less heat you apply, the better—it doesn't hurt to hang dry your favorite item to avoid potential changes in fit or texture. A trick for maintaining a sweater's shape is to flat dry on a solid surface. In some cases, the label may state "Drip Dry" instead of "Tumble Dry" or "Dry in Shade" if wet clothing should avoid direct sunlight.

Clothing label cheat sheet

Sometimes decoding clothing label instructions can be difficult, but there are a few tricks to understanding common symbols. Bleaching is denoted with a triangle, dry cleaning with a circle, drying with a square (or circle inside a square for tumble dry), washing with a trapezoid bisected by a wavy line, and ironing with a trapezoid bisected by a curved line.

As a general rule for heat instructions, the more dots on the label, the higher the temperature. But consult the breakdown below for specific temperature limits:

Machine Wash

• Normal: Water temperature does not have any heat restrictions
• Cold: Water temperature should not exceed 85 degrees Fahrenheit
• Warm: Water temperature should not exceed 105 degrees Fahrenheit
• Hot: Water temperature should not exceed 120 degrees Fahrenheit

Ironing

• Low: Temperature should not exceed 230 degrees Fahrenheit
• Medium: Temperature should not exceed 300 degrees Fahrenheit
• High: Temperature should not exceed 390 degrees Fahrenheit

When it comes to clothing maintenance, the fine print matters. If you're pressed for time or unsure of specific treatment requirements, consider the array of services offered at a dry cleaner—from Dry Clean, Launder & Press to Hand Wash—to ensure your top pieces are well taken care of.

Photos: Francis Duval, Jeff Sheldon, Clark Street Mercantile, Clark Street Mercantile

Often our favorite garments are those with good stories. Maybe that special piece of clothing was a gift or worn at a memorable event. But have you ever considered the story of the garment before it became yours?

The life of a garment is not a boring life, that’s for sure. From fiber to textile production, design, and fabrication, to transport and retail sales, every article of clothing is the culmination of lots of effort and imagination.

Historically, people held onto garments for a long time, but with cheap clothing now abundantly available, many societies throughout the world think of clothing as disposable. The staggering volume of new garments manufactured each year have made this paradigm shift possible.

Clothing Production

150 billion garments per year are produced in the global fashion industry, which means about 20 items per person.

Cotton is the most commonly used raw material for fabric in the world, with 60% of women’s garments and 75% of men’s garments containing some cotton. Once the cotton fiber is harvested, it’s spun into a fabric which can be easily cut to specific design requirements.

The fabric is sold to clothing manufacturers, who manage the actual production and fabrication of the garments. Once production is complete, garments are shipped to a distribution center, where they are stored until needed at retail locations.

The Typical Lifecycle of a Garment

After the garment is sold, it may be used once, dozens of times, or never at all, before it ends up being thrown away, repurposed, or recycled.

So how many times are garments generally worn? Although there is little data currently available, a detailed survey of almost 2,000 women found that the majority of fashion purchases see the outside of the wardrobe just seven times.

As a result, Americans sent 14 million tons of clothing to landfills in 2018, all while continuing to purchase new garments at a frenzied pace. To put this in more relatable terms, the average American now generates 82 pounds of waste just from clothes they throw away every year!

Adding to the concern, more than 60 percent of fabric fibers are now oil-based synthetics, meaning if and when our clothing ends up in a landfill, they don’t decay.

Despite these large numbers, a problem at such a massive scale does in fact start with actions at the micro level. How many times you wear your garments, and how you dispose of them once it’s time to let them go, both define the life of your garment.

According to the Council for Textile Recycling, nearly one-half of used clothing is given away for donations by the general public. Simply donating your used clothing instead of throwing it away makes a significant impact on the life of your garment, and there are incredibly convenient ways to make it happen.

With Rinse, clothing donations pickup is always free during any one of your scheduled pickups, and it is a great way to extend the life of your garments by giving someone else the opportunity to enjoy them. Another way to counteract the problem of excessive clothing waste is to increase the number of times you wear your garments. A good rule of thumb is to aim for at least 30 uses.

To get to 30 uses, it’s important to ensure the proper care and cleaning of your clothes. When washing clothes, use cold water, as it’s not only helpful in preventing color bleeding and fading but helps to preserve the strength and integrity of the fibers.

Additionally, you can switch from high or medium heat to low heat in the dryer, which also helps to increase the longevity of your garments and reduces the risk of shrinkage and malformation of clothes over multiple cleanings. Or working with Rinse or your local cleaner can help!

So next time you slip into your favorite garment, take a moment to consider not only where it came from, but also where it’s going. And when you choose to extend the life of your garments, you’re making a choice that benefits more than just your wardrobe.