Save the clothes!

February 4, 2010 10:18 PM

Will dry cleaners take wet clothes? Alternatively, help me save my girlfriend's clothes!

Without going into boring, needless, prosaic, uninteresting, jejune, banal details - a decent amount of vomit got on some of my girlfriend's clothes, specifically a silk chiffon (sp?) blouse, a wool blend vest and some wool/polyester pants. She hand-washed the various clothing at midnight tonight and the clothes are currently drying. She'd like to take them to a dry cleaners in the morning, but is worried the dry cleaners won't take damp clothing. Will they? Alternatively, what is the best way to get her clothes clean and in wearable shape at this point?

posted by slide to Clothing, Beauty, & Fashion (4 answers total)

Best answer: My dry cleaners (the sometimes hit-and-miss but very convenient) Milt & Edie's in Burbank is open 24 hours, so I just called them and essentially pretended to be you! They said it's no problem for the clothes to be damp, they'll go through the process just the same. This was the overnight team and not a manager or expert, so don't take it as certain, but it sounds like you have a good chance.
posted by crabintheocean at 12:21 AM on February 5, 2010 [2 favorites]

Dry cleaners indeed do not care whether the clothes are wet. The term "dry" actually refers to the fact that they don't use water in the process, but rather a chemical (perchloroethylene or something like that).

As for getting them clean, considering the silk, I'd definitely go the dry cleaning route.
posted by AugieAugustus at 4:48 AM on February 5, 2010

Are they not clean after the had washing? That's usually entirely appropriate for cleaning wool and silk.

At any rate, the cleaners will take them.
posted by oneirodynia at 10:59 AM on February 5, 2010

Response by poster: They were clean, but there was a bit of a smell... the dry-cleaners did take them, though, we got them back tonight, and my girlfriend says they're in perfect condition. So all's well that ends well. Thanks for calling, crabintheocean! Wonder if NYC has any 24-hour dry cleaners? Never even thought something like that could exist.
posted by slide at 7:02 PM on February 6, 2010