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How to Care for Your Dress Shirts?

Caring for your dress shirts the right way will mean a more professional appearance, and that your shirts will last longer.

Professional laundering: The easy route
Unless you really enjoy washing and ironing your shirts, sending dress shirts out to the cleaners is usually the better way to go. For just a couple of bucks each, your shirts will be returned to you clean, pressed and looking new.

When you drop your shirts off at the cleaners (and yes, it'll probably be your neighborhood dry cleaners, although they won't be dry cleaning the shirts), they'll ask a few questions:

  1. Boxed or on a hanger?
    There's usually no difference in the cost, but boxed shirts are easier to store on a shelf, while shirts on a hanger will have fewer creases. That said, the wire hangers your cleaner uses aren't great for the shoulders of a shirt, so if you plan on storing them for any length of time, it's best to move the shirts on to a plastic or wooden hanger with a firm shoulder.
  2. Starch or no starch?
    Wrinkle-free shirts definitely don't need starch. And for your regular dress shirts, try them without starch and see if you really need it. Starch causes the fibers of a shirt to weaken and can lead to your shirts wearing out faster. Again, it'll cost the same whether you request starch or not.

Home laundering: Gentler, but time consuming
Caring for your shirts at home may mean fewer missing buttons. Hand ironing that can look better than machine pressing if you know what you're doing.

To wash and dry your shirts, follow the manufacturer's care instructions (found on the tag inside the shirt). To iron like a pro, you'll need a good steam iron, and here are a few pointers to set you on your way:

  • Begin to iron your dress shirt with the underside of the collar. Smooth away from the collar points towards the back of the neck. Continue by ironing the front of the collar.
  • Next, iron the yoke area from the neck outwards, and then iron the pleats in the same direction of the fold.
  • Iron the cuffs of your shirt inside out as well. Put the sleeves down flat and iron upwards toward the shoulders.
  • Don't forget to iron the other side of the shirt sleeve before moving on to the next sleeve.
  • Iron the body of your shirt by starting at the top and moving downwards towards the hem.

 
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