Utilikilt care

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Utilikilt care

pile of clothes Right now your brand-new Utilikilt has sharp creases and a solid color. This too shall page: it'll fade, it'll get worn, it'll get all used up. Accept this inevitability, and then dealing with it becomes possible.

Utilikilts aren't designed to be formal vestments (except the tuxedo variant, with which I have no experience). They'll undergo the same sort of ware and tear as all other denim clothes, like your jeans. There is little that you can do, but do these nonetheless. You can minimize the effects of entropy, but you can't freeze or reverse them. Sorry.

Elsewhere I've mentioned using vinegar as mordant (color fixative). Vinegar didn't seem to do very much at all, at least for the chocolate Workman's model. Investigating the way that material was made might give us a bit of insight, but I suspect it won't add much longevity to the garment.

clothes washer The greatest destroyers of clothing are sunlight, friction, and poor garment care. Don't leave your Utilikilt (or any other wearables) lying in sunlight when you're not wearing them. Line-drying in the direct sun will take its toll. (During my many trips to Arizona I was constantly amazed how quickly our bath towels would dry on a clothes-line strung between two nopal cacti.)

Friction destroys the integrity of the fabric. When you slide off benches, play on the rocks, or on the frame of a building you're putting up, be mindful of abrasive surfaces and sharp edges and things which catch the material. Abrasion will weaken the fibers, making tears happen that much sooner. Actually tearing the fabric is its own torture.

Lastly, washing and drying. I've found that washing in cold water stresses clothing less than warm or hot water.

Detergents? I'm not convinced they're terribly necessary for the average washing of my Utilikilt, but I'm not sure that's true. Spilled food and drink, oils from the environment, and other insults like bird poop, probably have to be cleaned out of clothing before they're dried in and cause discolorations. (I've been sorely tempted to soak an food-stained shirt in a vat of olive oil to see if I can stain the thing everywhere. I'll test it someday.) Consumer Reports doesn't mention enzyme-active detergents, but some lists of stain-specific cleaning instructions (and they're worth searching the web for these) seem to think this is important. My mother-in-law does. So pick a detergent with which you're comfortable. Hit the stains and spills you see with something before you wash it (and make sure the stain is out before you dry it, or it will set forever).

Drying is the last bastion of controversy. The Utilikilt folks suggest flat- or line-drying, but I've found it inconvenient and not especially effective at keeping the pleats crisp. Pulling the pleats taut and flat and then actually tossing it into my dryer, on a gentle "less dry" setting seems to be the best of all. If I were more serious about keeping a cotton Utilikilt for office wear (a setting to which I never go anymore) I would either use spray starch and an iron or make a pact with my neighborhood dry cleaner.

Have you found errors nontrivial or marginal, factual, analytical and illogical, arithmetical, temporal, or even typographical? Please let me know; drop me email. Thanks!
 

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