How to clean your wedding dress

When it comes to cleaning the wedding dress, most people would say “Dry Clean” ! This may not be necessary if the dress is not made with natural fabric such as Silk, Cotton, Linen… In my thirty years of experience within the wedding dress industry, I have been asked many times “How do you clean a wedding gown after the wedding?”  The simple answer to that question is “ you can put it in the washing machine.  Wash it just like you would clean your other dresses”.

For most women, The Wedding dress is the most  important dress to preserve. Not only because the dress carries memory one treasure forever, but also traditionally a mother may give it to the daughter to wear  when she gets married, or another family member passes on their gown which symbolizes continuation of family tradition. 

Today, most wedding dresses are made with synthetic fabric, Polyester. The lace is usually made with Nylon, Rayon, Polyester, oftentimes, the dress is beaded with crystal, pearl, sequins, bugle  beads…

When you are ready to clean your gown in the washing machine, the First step is to  prepare a big netting or tulle bag, preferably 50” X 30”(Length X Width),  the bigger the better.  Second step, prepare the following items: (1) two small white clean cotton towels (2) a clean soft toothbrush (3)  hand soap and/or mild detergent (4) a big cup of distilled water (5) a flat drying area or a big rack. Third step,  pre-clean the area on the dress  that has stain, wine or water marks, or dirty marks caused by skirt dragging on the floor, or people's footprints.  Use two dry, clean. white towels, hold one towel in one hand  and  place underneath the dirty spot, the other hand holds a soft toothbrush, gently brush out  the dirty area with mild soap,( it can be the regular face soap), then clean with distilled water. The towel underneath can absorb water, so the wet area  doesn’t spread too wide. then blotting it with the other clean towel. Next step, Turn the dress inside out, so the crystal, sequins, beads… will be protected during machine wash. Last step, place the inside out gown in the big netting bag. Put the bag  into the washing machine, use just a tiny bit of mild detergent, turn the machine to “ Delicate/Gentle”,  then wash the dress.  When the wash is finished, remove the gown from the bag, check and make sure all is clean.

After the dress is washed, place it flat on a rack, then place the rack in the shade, do not have direct contact with the sun, let it dry naturally. Once it is dried , you can fold and pack it and store away.

This is simple and easy to do, it saves the expensive dry clean charge. and your gown will look just like brand new. You then have your gown to share with another family member in the future.