How to starch a petticoat or dress at home?

Starch has long been used to give clothes a fresh, smart look. Our grandmothers and great-grandmothers knew well how to starch a dress. It would seem like a distant past... However, even today starch has found its use.

Any starched product will look brand new and shine with freshness. The fact is that a very thin breathable film is formed on the fabric, protecting it from contamination. During washing, it is easily washed off, and the dirt goes away with it.

Why starch garments?

• The dress will receive a clearer, voluminous shape that will last until the next wash.
• The impression of freshness and presentability will last longer.
• The product will wrinkle less.
• The outlines of the collar and cuffs will remain correct and uncreased due to their rigidity.

A starched knitted dress will look especially impressive. It stretches less, holds its shape, the pattern becomes more prominent, the threads of the knitted fabric lie more evenly. And even the color of the thing seems to become cleaner and brighter.

How to prepare starch paste?

At home, ordinary potato starch is used for this purpose, which is always present in the arsenal of any housewife.

Important!

If you go to a dry cleaner, your item will be starched with chemical additives.

There are three degrees of hardness when preparing paste: soft, medium and strong.

• For soft water, add 1 teaspoon of starch to 1 liter of water - in order to starch a dress made of thin fabric, such as cambric or chiffon.
• For average 1 liter of water, dilute 1 tablespoon of starch - for knitted dresses or made from linen or cotton.
• For strong – 2 tablespoons – prepared for starching individual parts of the outfit: flounces, collar, cuffs.

First, cold water is poured into the starch, the resulting lumps are thoroughly rubbed, achieving homogeneity and consistency comparable to thick sour cream. And only then pour boiling water in a thin stream, bringing the volume to 1 liter. Before immersing the dress in the liquid paste, the composition should be cooled.

What to do with the dress?

To be able to starch a dress, it must be completely saturated with starch for 30–40 minutes. During this time, it won’t hurt to turn it over several times. Then remove from the liquid, squeeze out the excess paste and hang the item on a hanger. The dress should be dried at room temperature, away from heating radiators, and never turn on an electric dryer or other heating devices.
Adviсe

1. To give the fabric an elegant shine, add a little table salt to the diluted starch.
2. You can enhance the shine if you drop a little melted stearin into the paste.
3. Sometimes you can see recommendations to dry a starched product in the cold. This is possible, but it is unlikely that this method will give the product additional rigidity.

It is best to iron a starched dress while slightly damp; this will allow you to carefully smooth out all the small details and folds, avoiding creases and maintaining its shape.If the dress is still dry, there is no need to steam it with an iron; it is better to sprinkle it with water or iron it through a damp thin cloth. If the iron sticks to the fabric, add a few drops of turpentine to the diluted starch.

Wedding dress: to starch or not?

It may not be necessary to completely starch a wedding dress at home. But you will have to soak the petticoats with paste to make the skirt fluffy. If there are several petticoats, you can adjust the volume by processing not all petticoats.

Here's how to starch a petticoat: grease the underskirt with a starch solution (make it harder) and iron it without waiting for it to dry completely.

Advice

There is a simple rule: you can – and sometimes need to – starch everything except underwear and black items. Otherwise, the linen will lose moisture permeability, and the black item will become covered with whitish stains.

Make a child's dress more elegant

With a festive children's dress, do the same as with a wedding dress. That is, petticoats are starched and then ironed. Such dresses are usually decorated with small details: ruffles, flounces, frills, which after washing look drooping and wrinkled. They should also be starched and ironed with a small iron.

Something about the starching technique

By the way, to treat individual parts of a dress, be it a child’s or an adult’s, it is convenient to use a starch spray, sold in branded household chemical stores. The spray is sprayed onto the collar, cuffs or flounces, which are immediately ironed.

A knitted dress is starched in accordance with the general rules, but it also has its own characteristics. Of course, you can’t hang it to dry.The dress is dried in a horizontal position laid on a towel. If lace is knitted along the hem, they need to be straightened and secured in the desired shape with tailor's pins.