How should I press my shirt?
The best shirts still need to be ironed or pressed correctly to look as good as you deserve. Whether you are the ironer in your household or not, you can benefit from knowing a few tricks that my mother taught me…
Hang your shirts promptly
While leaving them in the washer or dryer might be convenient at times, the longer that you leave them there, the harder they are going to be to iron, and the shorter their life expectancy will be. Remember, much of the damage to your clothes is not caused when you wear them, but when you wash them!
Hang your shirts promptly, preferably on a good quality timber hanger.
100% cotton: Humidity counts
When you are ironing a 100% cotton shirt, iron it damp from washing, or at least spray the shirt and let it sit in a plastic bag for 10 or 15 minutes. This will dissolve so much of your hard work by relaxing the fibres. The result: Less wrinkles and sharper creases.
Follow the guidelines given by your iron manufacturerSet the iron temperature to suit the fabric that you’re ironing. It sounds simple… but make sure that you still do it!
- Collar first: Start by pressing the wrong side of the collar, then press the right or visible side both of the band and of the collar itself.
- Upper shirt: Press around the upper portion and yoke of the shirt, moving from one side of the front, around the back to the other side of the front.
- Sleeves: First the cuff wrong sides, then the cuff right sides, then the rest of the sleeves. Yes, this is done before the rest of the shirt.
- Position the sleeve placket side up, with the underarm seam along one edge; smooth the sleeve to find the upper arm crease. Then, flip the sleeve over and press that side before repeating for the other arm.
- Lower shirt: Press the remainder of the shirt, working from one side of the front around the back to the other side of the front.
- Hang: With the shirt ironed, give it space to cool and dry completely.
Tags: garment care, shirts