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#1 2006-07-13 15:37:15
- GFBurke
- Member
- From: Brooklyn, NY
- Posts: 81
weathered/distressing clothes techniques
Pursuant to recent 'tattered trad' discussions, I have some inexpensive OCBDs I want to experiment with. Right now they feel too crispy and new. OCBDs to me should be soft and well-worn, else they are too dressy. Looking at designer denim it is distressed and whiskered at the factory to look broken in. That to me is a little excessive, but why not do it yourself?
Short of wearing the OCBD for ten years and washing it repeatedly, are there any techniques to knock the newness out of one? Judicious use of fine sandpaper at collar and cuffs? Washing in salt water or with a tiny dab of bleach? I want this shirt to look like it's been around the block a few times but not like it's falling apart. It'll look better when wearing it with shorts and stuff.
Thoughts?
#2 2006-07-13 16:04:00
- Coolidge
- Member
- Posts: 1192
Re: weathered/distressing clothes techniques
Last edited by Coolidge (2006-07-13 16:08:18)
#3 2006-07-13 16:15:30
- GFBurke
- Member
- From: Brooklyn, NY
- Posts: 81
Re: weathered/distressing clothes techniques
Good points Coolidge, thanks. I am looking into Mercer shirts.
And you're absolutely right about well made items acquiring their own patina. In this case perhaps I was being impatient. 
#4 2006-07-14 00:23:56
- Horace
- Member
- Posts: 6432
Re: weathered/distressing clothes techniques
""This is probably the last Deb season...because of the stock market, the economy, Everything..." - W. Stillman.
#5 2006-07-14 01:35:47
- tricket
- New member
- Posts: 4
Re: weathered/distressing clothes techniques
My experience is quite on the contrary. Wear your new and crispy OCBDs as dress shirts as if they are real dress shirts and crispy enough to be worn as dress shirts. Send them to commercial laundry. Ask them to STARCH and professionally press the shirts. These two processes make the shirts weather much faster than what you otherwise do at home. You will be satisfied with the broken in effect after about 10 washes.
#6 2006-07-15 05:14:30
- Miles Away
- Member
- From: Miles away
- Posts: 1180
Re: weathered/distressing clothes techniques
My mate Jim offers this:
Sandpaper will only wear things down. Use an OLD Brillo pad (sans the odd pink soap it is infused with when new) this will wear away the cloth but also raise the nap at the same time & look much better.
Buy cheap & bleach also - LLBean & Landsend are the most obvious condidates for this.
Buy Mercer/Brooks/Press by all means, but let them age with grace and dignity. They'll look better that way.
Cheap stuff can be trashed with a clear conscience and it will always look fantastic. Much better than it ever does when pristine.
I love Bean Chambray shirts after a dip in the bleach. Much better than when new.
Old Brooks (et al) is 'Tattered Trad'.
Beaten up Bean is 'Trashable Trad'.
Both have their place.
" ... Ubi bene, ibi patria, which being roughly translated means, 'Wherever there's a handout, that's for me, man.' "
Alistair Cooke. 1968.
#7 2006-07-15 08:00:10
- mrwynn
- Member
- Posts: 34
Re: weathered/distressing clothes techniques
If you machine wash at home and dry in the drying machine (not recommended for shirts you want to keep looking new) then wash and line dry you will get a nice relaxed appearance. Uniqlo, the Japanese chain, sort if the Muji of clothing, has some great worn in OCBDs for less than $20. Uniqlo is moving into the US aggressively, with two stores in Manhattan and another two under construction.