By Ragan Robinson
Read the fine print in any lingerie department. It’s nearly impossible to find a bra that says you can toss it in the washer, much less into the dreaded dryer. Not that it means we don’t.
For delicates, DON’T:
1. Use a washing machine. It’s called an agitator for a reason. You wouldn’t tug on your favorite lacy number that way. Why let the machine?
2. Wash with heavier-duty clothes. Your denim or other tough materials will wear out bras and fragile underwear quicker.
3. Dry in a dryer. Any time you heat elastic or Spandex or other stretchy material, you take out some of the elasticity. You also make it more likely to break. And a hot dryer will shrink many of the fabrics bras are made from — you don’t want the outside of your cup shrinking while the inside padding stays the same size.
But if you ARE going to use the washer for bras:
1. Use a medium or high water-level setting. More water means your delicates won’t rub together as much, which reduces the strain on seams and lace.
2. Hook the back. So your clasps don’t get caught in the small holes and your bra doesn’t get stretched out.
3. Skip the mesh bag for bras with underwire. If you have to wad up the bra to get it in, it twists the wire and makes it more likely to break or poke through the fabric.
3. Opt for a front loader. Noy Yang, who manages the Wash & Dry Laundromat in Morganton, says she tripled the life of her bras when she switched from a top loader to a front loader.
Anne Riggan, a bra fitter at Belk in Morganton, guesses that 90 percent of women ignore the label advice on their bras and underwear.
And with good reason, say those women.
There’s no time for hand washing bras, says Marnie Price of Valdese, who throws her delicates in the washer and dryer just like jeans and T-shirts.
The same goes for Morganton’s Allison Coffey. And she’s not going to waste precious minutes making sure the back is hooked or the bra is in a lingerie bag, either.
“If I had to do anything special like that, I’d do without,” she says.
Both Price and Coffey say their bras last a year or more.
Jewell Randolph of Marion says hers never wear out. She only buys new bras when she gets tired of wearing the old ones.
But Randolph heeds the manufacturers’ directions, at least somewhat. Her delicates go in the gentle cycle. And she stopped putting them in the dryer, which she says seems to stretch out her straps.
Millie Ornberg of Marion, who has equally good luck, is even more of a stickler for the lingerie rules. She always hand washes and has never put a bra in the dryer.
It’s not that difficult, says Eleanor Summers, the family and consumer sciences agent with Burke County’s N.C. Cooperative Extension Agency.
She recommends using a small amount of mild detergent — Ivory liquid or a generic cold-water wash — in a sink or basin. Let your bra soak for about three minutes before swirling it around in soapy water. To rinse, submerge the bra in another bin. Don’t run water over the fabric.
That can damage flimsy fabric.
To speed up drip-drying time, you can also put the bra between two towels and press. Don’t wring or twist your bras — it’s bad for the underwire.
So are the mesh lingerie bags, Riggan says. Avoid anything that bends the underwire. That makes it more likely to poke through the fabric.
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Monday, January 15, 2007
