Dry Cleaning

leaskovski

leaskovski

leaskovski

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Joined
22 Oct 2004
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Berkland
Hi all,

Right, first question....

Can the process of 'Dry Cleaning' a material cause it to shrink?

The reason for asking, is that I took some rather expensive made to measure curtains down to my local Dry Cleaners for them to clean. One set came back ok. The other set was cleaned at a later date due to them questioning if the blackout material was ok to go through the cleaning process. So I went to pick up the second set yesterday, got them home, and to my disappointment, they had managed to shrink them. :( The blackout material itself hasn’t shrunk, but the main display material has, thus the lining is hanging below the bottom of the curtain.

I have been back to them to see what they are going to do about this and am now await a reply back. In case of a poor result, i.e. they say, "it isn’t our problem", what sort of leg do I have to stand on? I fear I am going to get the finger from them. :(

My personal opinion is that they are to blame and thus should cover the cost of replacing them. I have tags for the material saying that they should be professionally dry cleaned and a letter saying the blackout material is ok for this as well.
 
They shrunk them and should replace/fix the problem to your satisfaction in my opinion. See what they have to say before getting shirty with them though.
 
What a load of pants. I think you should sock 'em one, and invest in a better dry cleaning service elsewhere.

That was bad. I'll get my coat.
 
becuaese dry cleaning still uses machines, and there is not too much room for human error - it is more likely to be the fault of the machine that the second batch was washed in. wool and cotton are sadi to shrink while being dry cleaned.

due to the size / scale of curtains, even a tiny amount of shrinking will make a very noticable difference.

either way, if they were given clear instructions then surly it is their fault?

hughjoen said:
March 15th, 2007, 12:48 PM
Earthmover gave a correct answer. Cottons and wool do shrink if the machine used is not running correctly. Particularly, if the machine has high level of humidity because out of adjustment.

My friend owns a Dry Clean, just told me some inexperienced cleaners will wash cotton instead of dry cleaning them because they clean better (particularly if its heavely soiled w/o telling the customer). Do you think they might of washed them? You'd be suprised how many cleaners are very inexperienced.
Click to expand...

I found this here:
http://www.styleforum.net/archive/index.php/t-32026.html


what are the curtains made of?
 
I work at a fabric place where we make made to measure curtains. It is rare for dry cleaners to shrink curtains but when they do we usually have the customer back through our door saying it was our fault. All our customers leave the store with leaflets telling them about dry cleaning and are also verbally told that the curtains will not wash unless they are dry cleaned.

Sounds like they have washed the 2 pairs differently.

We usually steam our fabrics first to get the initial shrinkage.

How much have they shrunk by? We usually have quite a substantial hem at the bottom of the curtain so if the curtain did shrink we will let the hems down slightly.
 
yikes. unless your curtain maker has done some epic hem dropping the hem isnt going to happen :(

Ive heard of shrinkage but 6inches! my god, your dry cleaner has definately done something wrong
 
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