Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Storage of Wool Clothing

As a professional seamstress, I am surprised by how often I am asked if I can repair moth damage in either knitwear or woven cloth. My customers usually need to be reminded to PROPERLY STORE THEIR CLOTHING to prevent this damage, for it is not easily repaired. Seattle still hosts a few re-weavers who can, at considerable expense to the consumer, reweave a moth hole in cloth. I do not practice this trade. Most seamstresses will have slightly better results mending a moth hole in a sweater, but it never looks perfectly new again.

I don't believe there is a state in the union that does not have wool-eating moths. Growing up in the Midwest, my family always stored their woolens in large trunks in the attic...trunks left over from the guilded age of steam ship travel, no doubt. They were airtight, and they worked well, but few of today's homes have either trunks or attics.

My preferred clothing storage containers for woolens are canvas dress bags that I've found at a most reasonable cost at my local Wal-Mart store. Canvas, or any heavy cloth, allows the fabric to breathe. Plastic garment bags, in addition to being easily damaged, do not allow any air flow at all. Nor is there air flow in sealed, solid plastic containers.

Protect your clothing investments. Have your woolen garments cleaned before you retire them for the summer, and store them in a carefully closed, cloth garment bag.  Or in a large steamer trunk in the attic!

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