A bespoke dress shirt is a perfect complement to any suit well-cut suit. However, a high-quality dress shirt deserves high-quality care, which doesn’t entail frequent trips through your wash cycle with the rest of your whites. Shirt dry cleaning is the preferred method of caring for your high-end dress shirts as it will help keep them looking crisp and new, ensuring your investment pays off for years to come.
Before covering why pricey dress shirts need dry cleaning in Vancouver, let’s consider what makes a $30 dress shirt different from the kind of dress shirt you buy from specialty clothiers and why they are entitled to special care.
One of the most significant distinctions between a bespoke dress shirt and an average dress shirt is the quality of the construction. A high-quality dress shirt will have around 16 stitches per inch compared to as few as 8 to 10 on lesser-quality shirts. While this may not seem to be a dramatic disparity, the difference in quality is noticeable in look and feel.
You can also spot a bespoke dress shirt by noticing how patterns line up at the seams. Lower-quality, mass-produced shirts rarely match patterns at the seams; the process is too complicated and time-consuming. However, a bespoke dress shirt maker puts every effort into matching patterns at the seams, even with complex designs and challenging angles.
While there are plenty of fabric options, even in the high-end category, cotton remains king for bespoke dress shirts. Cotton isn’t used exclusively by high-end dress shirt makers, however, the cotton quality can vary dramatically depending on what price point you are shopping at. Bespoke dress shirts tend to be made from longer-strand cotton fibres, which are higher quality than short strands, but also more expensive to produce.
Bespoke dress shirts also usually feature genuine mother-of-pearl buttons rather than the plastic ones typical of lower-quality shirts. It’s a small detail but one that a keen eye is likely to notice.
Mass-produced shirts are designed to fit as many different bodies as possible without significantly altering the design. The result is a shirt that fits most people but none of them very well. Bespoke shirts are created to provide a more flattering look for your body type, with tailored sleeves, length, and chest fit.
Investing in a few high-quality shirts will leave you feeling more polished and professional, and over the long run, these quality garments will outlast their cheaper counterparts – if you care for them correctly.
Professionally laundering your shirts at a dry cleaner in Vancouver is the preferred way to care for expensive fabrics. This service is the best way to address body oils and other water-soluble stains while skipping the agitation of your typical washing machine. Professional laundering also comes with professional pressing for a polished, crisp look ironing at home fails to achieve.
When you take your bespoke shirts in for dry cleaning in Vancouver, experienced cleaners evaluate the garment based on the type of fabric and specific areas that need to be addressed. For example, it’s not uncommon for collars and cuffs to need extra attention, or perhaps stubborn stains need to be taken care of. Professional dry cleaning can target these specific areas ensuring your get back a perfectly laundered, crisp, clean shirt without being unnecessarily harsh on the fabric.