No care label on your suit? How to decide how to wash it

Step one: find out what the fabric is

You do not need a laboratory answer, only enough to choose a starting point. Our article on describing unlabelled fabric has more simple checks, and explains why a burn test is not worth the risk.

• The packaging of an unstitched suit: the box, sleeve or swing tag normally names the fabric and often gives washing instructions. Our guide to reading an unstitched suit label shows where.
• The brand’s product page: search the design code or collection name; care notes are often listed there.
• Your order paperwork: if we made the outfit, the agreed fabric is named in your written quote.
• The fabric itself: cotton creases when squeezed and soaks up a drop of water at once; polyester springs back and lets the drop sit; viscose is soft, cool and heavy in the hand; wool blends feel warm and slightly hairy.

Step two: check trims, lining and colour contrasts

A garment is only as washable as its most delicate part. Look for:

• Lining: it may shrink more or less than the outer fabric, so wash cool and dry flat the first time.
• Lace and borders: cotton lace can shrink and pucker an edge.
• Embroidery: light thread work tolerates a gentle wash; metallic thread, beads, sequins and glued stones do not like soaking.
• Buttons and tassels: fabric-covered buttons and tassels can bleed or fray.
• Contrast piping or panels: a deep colour beside a pale one is the commonest cause of a ruined first wash.

Step three: test a hidden spot

Choose an inside seam allowance or the back of the hem. Press a white cloth dampened with cool water and a drop of your detergent against it for half a minute, and repeat on each colour, including embroidery thread and piping. Colour on the cloth means wash that piece alone in cold water, or have it dry cleaned. Then let the spot dry: a ring, a stiff patch or a loss of sheen tells you water does not agree with the fabric. Our colour-fastness test describes fuller versions. If offcuts came back with your outfit, wash one first and compare it with the garment.

Step four: start with the gentlest method

Move up one rung at a time, and only if the rung below went well. Do not begin with a hot wash, a tumble dryer or bleach. Go straight to a dry cleaner with silk or anything that might be silk, velvet, wool blends, heavy or metallic embroidery, lined jackets and waistcoats, and anything that failed the test. For garments that do have labels, the pictures are decoded in care label symbols explained.

• Air and spot clean between wears.
• Cool hand wash, alone, for a few minutes with mild detergent; no wringing; dry flat or on a hanger in the shade.
• Gentle machine cycle at 30°C in a mesh bag with a low spin, once the piece has come through two or three hand washes unchanged.
• Low iron first, tried on a hidden area, raising the heat only if the creases will not move.

Write your own label

Once you know what works, record it. A note on your phone with a photo of the outfit, or a card in its garment bag, saves working it out again next year, and helps anyone else who does the laundry.

You can also sort this out before the outfit exists. With unstitched suit stitching, photograph the packaging and care card before you send your fabric and keep the pictures. With Fabric + Stitching, ask in your enquiry how the agreed fabric should be washed, and whether offcuts can be returned with your order; we confirm what is possible in the written quote. Request a Stitching Only quote when you are ready.