Why you should NEVER dry clean your wedding dress (or any wedding garments) right before your wedding

Guest post by Shannon Davis
dry cleaning wedding garments on Offbeat Bride
Photo by Wild About You Photography

I have worked in a hotel laundry for the last six years. I have received basic training in dry cleaning — enough to deal with our hotel's uniforms and basic garments. In the last six years, on a regular basis, I have watched countless brides and grooms send down their wedding garments to be cleaned, often at the last minute.

I have also seen more disasters concerning people's clothes than I care to remember.

Here's my insight and advice about when to dry clean your wedding dress and the hazards involved in getting your wedding clothes dry cleaned or pressed at the last minute…

After working in my job for six years I can say that unplanned accidents do happen…

What happens if you send your wedding finery down the morning of you wedding to be dry cleaned and the machine breaks down and your clothes are stuck inside the machine for an unforeseeable amount of time? I have seen that happen with someone's bridesmaid dresses. Thankfully they were getting them cleaned the week before the wedding, so that wasn't a major disaster.

What if a pen somehow ends up inside the dry cleaning machine? Pens, that go through the machine cycles, leak all over the garments more often than not.

Or what happens if your dress has gorgeous material flowers attached to it but the person who made the dress used glue to help attach the flowers so they wouldn't fall off… and the glue melts all over the dress? These are things I have seen happen.

If you are only sending your garments down to be pressed…

While pressing isn't as much of a potential disaster as same-day cleaning could be, I have seen irons malfunction and burn holes into shirts in places where a fix would be noticeable. I have seen dresses catch on the machines and (best case scenario) snag or (worst case scenario) rip. I have seen the pressing machines malfunction and leave large brown dirty water stains on gowns.

Wedding dresses are a specialized garment…

Not everyone who works in the laundry will be trained in how to deal with them. What if the professional dry cleaner is away, sick, or you catch them on their day off? Chances are 50/50 that you will find someone working that day who has been trained in how to clean/press your specialized garments.

If you need a touch up right before the wedding…

To remove creases from your clothes, use a spray bottle with water and a hair dryer on the lowest setting to gently buff the creases out.

This is just one possible solution to last minute cleaning/pressing. Definitely consider your options in advance of your wedding date, so you don't end up with rogue pen-stained dress.

Offbeat Wed Vendor

This page features vendors from our curated Offbeat Wed Vendor Directory. They're awesome and we love them. If you're a vendor let's get you in here!

Meet our fave wedding vendors