How to care for and maintain your fashion pieces

Hello, and welcome to Lyndah in Style. My goal here, each and every day, is to inspire and help women like you and me to dress beautifully and appropriately for our unique days so we can engage graciously and authentically with those around us and influence them well.

Our appearance speaks volumes about us, you know before we even say a word. And that’s why it’s also important that we know how to care for our fashion investments so they last longer and look beautiful.

Today I’m sharing 5 ways to care for your fashion investments – particularly your shoes and handbags, lingerie, workout clothes, hanging clothes, and jeans – so that they keep their quality and serve you well…for the long haul.

This is not an exhaustive list of tips, of course. In fact, in an attempt toward brevity, I’m just sharing my top 5 tips in each area.

Care Tips for Shoes & Handbags

• When in season, store handbags on a shelf, upright with room to breath.
• Store shoes upright on the ground or on a shoe cabinet.
• During the off-season, stuff handbags with acid-free tissue paper so they keep their shape.
• Store handbags, during the off-season, in the dust bags that came with them.
• Don’t wear the same leather shoes two days in a row, if possible. Leather needs 24 hours to “recuperate” between wears. If you do wear your leather shoes daily, remove them as soon as you get home.

Care Tips for Delicates or Lingerie

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• Anything with elastic in it needs a “day off.” So rotate your bras daily.
• Wash all delicates – panties, bras, camis, fine lingerie, etc. – on a delicate cycle or by hand. I prefer to hand wash mine.
• Use a mesh lingerie bag when washing delicates in the washing machine to keep items from getting tangled or caught on fasteners.
• Don’t use the drying machine for your delicates. Hang them to dry on a drying rack.
• Twist and fold wire support bras in half at the center, inserting one cup inside the other and stuffing the straps in the cups. Store them in a drawer or shelf with room to breathe.

Care Tips for Workout Clothing

• Wear your workout clothes two to three times before washing unless they are soiled or very sweaty. Because of the types of fabric used in these elastic and moisture-wicking clothes, less frequent washing is better.
• Between wears, hang your workout clothes up to air out.
• When washing in the washing machine, add 1 – 1 1/2 cups of distilled white vinegar to the load to help remove odors.
• Don’t dry your workout clothes in the dryer, but hang them to dry.
• Do not use fabric softener in your washing machine with workout clothing. It damages or even removes some of the technology built into some of the gear.

Care Tips for Hanging Clothes

• Be sure to check collars of shirts with every washing. We tend to stain our collars with makeup, and it needs to be taken care of before washing or drying.
• Always treat stains as soon as possible.
• When ironing shirts, iron them in this order for the most effectiveness: collar, cuffs, sleeves, body.
• Once again, don’t wash your clothes any more often than necessary. Simply air them out between wears unless they must be washed. Including Jeans.
• Use hangers that do not stretch your clothing or leave indentations in the shoulders. Did you know that you can even buy hangers for petite size clothing? I have plastic ones but I intend to change them for wood or stainless steel.
• When hanging heavy clothing, use wooden hangers.

Care Tips for Jeans

• Only wash jeans if they are one of the 4 S’s: Soiled, Stained, Stinky or Stretched-out. The jeans of today are made of fabrics that wear out and lose their shape more quickly with over-washing.
• Instead of washing, air your jeans out. You can hang them over a chair, on a drying rack, or on a door rack.
• When you do wash jeans, turn them inside out to help retain their coloring.
• You can also add 1/2 cup distilled white vinegar to the load to help set the color of your dark wash jeans if desired.
• Don’t ever put your jeans in the dryer after washing. Instead, lay them on a drying rack. You may put them in the dryer for a few minutes when they are almost dry just to soften them a little. But then let them cool down before putting them on or they’ll quickly stretch out and lose their shape.

When you build a wardrobe of high-quality essentials, you want them to last. These tips will help you keep your wardrobe and accessories in good condition so they’ll serve you for years to come.

I know that most of the people who read this blog have been doing laundry and caring for clothes for more years than we like to count. But I always learn new things from articles like this, and maybe you did, too.

Also, as I said, this list is not exhaustive. Feel free to share additional clothes care tips in the comments for everyone’s benefit.

Thank you for spending time with me, God bless you.

Have a lovely week ahead!