Caring for your lingerie

Update: The experts on The Beauty Brains have disagreed with our recommendation for citrus prodcuts, and offer this advice:

Citrus oils are harder to rinse and have greater solvency for plastic and elastics than detergents do. So if this was true, we’d expect citrus based products to be more, not less, damaging to lingerie than “regular” hand wash products like Woolite. Therefore, this claim sounds like marketing hype to us. If anyone has tried these products, drop us a note and let us know how they worked for you.

They’re the chemists, so they know best! Of course, the most important thing is to hand-wash your lingerie as machines can distort the underwires over time. Happy washing!

-Danae

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Until recently, I thought washing lingerie was like washing everything else — throw it into the washing machine, and forget about it. A couple of ruined sets later, I’ve realised the obvious — lingerie requires special care, and you can’t just throw it into the machine.

Ideally, you should hand wash your lingerie in cold water, or if indicated, have it dry cleaned. For washing you should use a delicate soda-based fabric wash, such as Forever New, Eucalan, or Stergene (do not use Woolite). You should never wring out your lingerie, as this ruins it shape, as will throwing it into a dryer. Hang-dry the lingerie after washing.

If you do want to machine-wash your lingerie, use a lingerie bag and set the cycle to cold water. Lingerie bags are little mesh bags that allow in soap and water, but keep your lingerie from being stretched all around the machine. Here’s a U.S. bag for $5.50, and a UK link for £10.00 (although I’m sure you can find cheaper at a department store). There’s also one on eBay for a much more sensible £2.49.

I’ve compiled a few more links to give more detailed information on caring for your lingerie:

• Lingerie and Fabric Care: Goes through each type of fabric and gives specific care instructions for each.
• Rigby & Peller offer their own lingerie care product, Satin Bath
• Elle MacPherson Intimates lingerie care instructions: A short but useful list of basic instructions, points out that you should do up the hooks of your bra before laundering.
• Barely There Care guide: a good FAQ for care instructions.