How to Preserve Your Wedding Dress

After your special day, you’ll want to make sure your wedding dress is in the very best condition before putting it in storage for safekeeping. But without the proper steps to preserve it, you risk it getting discoloured or damaged over time. In this post, we’ll share with you the steps you should take to preserve your wedding dress and keep it safe for the future.

Get it Professionally Dry Cleaned

Although you only wore your wedding dress for one day, it’s important to get it dry cleaned before putting it in storage. Chances are it has body oils and sweat in the material, maybe even makeup that needs to be removed.

If you store your dress without getting it dry cleaned first, it’s more likely to discolour and turn a yellowish colour over time, not to mention it will start to get a must smell.

Whether your wedding was a week ago or years back and you never bothered with dry cleaning, bring your dress to us for professional dry cleaning ASAP to preserve it as best as possible.

Prepare Your Wedding Dress for Storage

Once your dress is fresh and clean, it’s time to prepare it for storage. You’ll need acid-free tissue paper to wrap the dress in – make sure it’s white so no colour can bleed onto the dress.

The tissue needs to sit between each fold of the dress to stop it from creasing while in its storage box.

Finally, stuff the bust and sleeves with tissue paper to help maintain the shape and stop sagging.

Put Your Dress in a Preservation Box

The best way to store your dress is in a special preservation box. These boxes are acid-free and filled with nitrogen rather than oxygen so it’s airtight and bacteria can’t grow.

Boxes with a seal shouldn’t be opened unless you intend to use the dress. However, you can get boxes without a seal which means you can open them just to look at the dress whenever you like. 

If you want to keep it closed, you can also get boxes with a window that lets you admire your dress without risking damage.

Store Your Preservation Box

Although preservation boxes can be big, you shouldn’t store them in the garage, attic, or cellar. Temperature and humidity fluctuate in these areas of the home and may lead to mildew problems, even with a preservation box.

Instead, store it in a cupboard, spare room, or under your bed to keep your dress as well-preserved as possible.

What About Breathable Bags?

When you buy your dress, it will come in a breathable bag that is adequate for storage before your wedding and in the weeks after. However, this isn’t a good option long-term.

Having your dress on a hanger will stretch it and cause it to become misshapen. It also leaves it open to moisture and risk of damage.

It’s best to transfer your dress into a preservation box as quickly as possible following dry cleaning to keep it safe.

Book Dry Cleaning for Your Wedding Dress

If you’ve just tied the knot in Haywards Heath and need to get your wedding dress professionally cleaned, we can help. We are a specialist dry cleaners that regularly clean wedding dresses, suits, and other wedding attire for our clients. Call us today to get a free quote: 01444 416 644