Seeking Fragile dress advice

frumbasyisroel

Sun, Jun 14 2015, 8:40 am

I bought two copies of the same dress (a dress I loved and was on sale).

The first dress I dry-cleaned and killed because the two colors (blue and white) seeped into one another. That one is killed. I'm not concerned about how to clean the second identical dress.

The material is:
Shell: 77% polyester, 20% rayon, 3% spandex
The lining is polyester

The dress is absolutely beautiful and two-toned. It has navy blue and white.

A huge issue with the dress is that the blue color seeps into the white material. The dress' instructions is to dry clean in hydrocarbon solvents. Even dry cleaners in my area that offer hydrocarbon solvents do not want to take responsiblity for the dress because they said all dresses are prone to seepage of one color into another.

Do you think it's safe to wash in cold water in the machine? Is there any detergent/product I can use to prevent seepage?

ra_mom

Sun, Jun 14 2015, 9:50 am

Can you try washing the ruined dress in the machine and see what happens?

It sounds like you may have to wash by hand I'm cold water with gentle detergent and there's no guarantee what will happen either.

zaq

Sun, Jun 14 2015, 11:01 am

RIT color remover can be used to remove signs of colors bleeding (that is the technical term for what happened to your dress). Beware, though, the colors of the dress may change completely, as the color remover may strip all the dye from the colored portion. Still, if you end up with a dress that's a clean grey and white rather than navy and white with messy blue streaks, you'll be ahead of the game.

Dresses that cannot be dry-cleaned because they are fragile silk and/or covered in sequins, beads, braid and similar embellishments can be freshened from the inside by wiping with baby wipes. On a dark dress this will let you wear the dress up to half a dozen times if you don't sweat heavily, and, as this kind of dress is usually very formal and memorable, that is about as many times as you can reasonably expect to wear it before everyone has seen it and you have to give it away, anyway. For a dress with large swaths of white, though, this may not be enough.

If the instructions are to dry clean, and you followed instructions, write to the manufacturer and ask for compensation. They may ignore you, but they may do something for you.

frumbasyisroel

Sun, Jun 14 2015, 2:45 pm

I was able to return the first dress for a full refund because of what happened.

I do not have it. The company went out of business so I can't return the second if something goes terribly wrong

ra_mom

Sun, Jun 14 2015, 7:25 pm

Spot clean the stains before you start so the dress doesn't need to be in water too long. Shout wipes would work well for this. Then wash really quickly by hand in cold water with just a drop of gentle detergent. Doesn't sound like there are many choices here.