Linen is a wonderful natural material that grows with a minimal impact on our planet. Linen bedding is often associated with summer, much due to the exceptional coolness and freshness the fabric is able to maintain in hot and humid weather. However, it is just as great to use in winter, too! The linen fiber is very strong, but items made out of linen still need proper care. This is a general guide on how to care for linen garments, helping you make them look better and last longer.
STAIN TREATMENT
If you get a stain on your garment, treat the stain straight away with a stain solution suitable for linen. By doing so the stain will already be pre-cleaned, which makes doing the laundry more efficient. Make sure to avoid stain solutions with bleach for coloured linen garments, since bleach can remove the colour out of the fabric and leave an unwanted light or orange spot. Bleach can also damage the fabric fibers.
WASH CAREFULLY
Unlike wool, linen does not have the natural anti-bacterial and odour-resistant properties, which means linen needs to be washed a little more often. Nevertheless, we suggest that you machine wash your linen garments at 30°C (cold) or even that you hand wash for spot treatments. This will save energy and expose the fibers to less stress - heat takes away the natural luster of the material - prolonging the lifetime of the garment. When washing colored garments, we recommend turning them inside out before. This process will help protect the outer surface of the fabric. Wash linen on low cycle to prevent shrinkage, creases and wrinkling.
DRY NATURALLY
Give the garment a good shake after wash and a light pull in the sleeves, plackets and side seams to remove creases. Hang drying linen garments reduces their wrinkles and their general creasing, while tumble drying will make the garments shrink. To prevent shrinkage in the drying process, linen garments should be air-dried and out of the sun if possible.
IRONING OR STEAMING
Due to poor elasticity of linen fibers, linen wrinkles very easily. Therefore more formal linen garments might need ironing, or preferably steaming, quite often, but the linen's wrinkles are often seen as a part of the material's charm and charasteristics. If you do want to iron your linen garment, spray the garment with water 5-10 minutes before ironing. This will make the ironing much easier. Due to the fibers' low elasticity, the fibers can break if they are ironed at the same place repeatedly over time.
STORING LINEN GARMENTS
The storage of linen garments is very simple. Keep the garments hanging in your wardrobe, preferably on wide wooden hangers instead of wire hangers as they result in less stress on the fabric and stitching and prevents the garment from getting permanently creased. Linen home textile should be stored folded in a dry place.