Imagining a wedding gown that lasts several generations isn\\'t hard. Some picture our own wedding gowns handed down from mother to daughter for a hundred years. Wedding dresses are made of cloth, silks, and other organic materials as well as nylon and metal. These things don\\'t last forever. That\\'s why preserving our wedding dresses is so important right after the wedding. Our great granddaughters of the future will thank us later. Wedding gowns and wedding dresses are delicate pieces of material, and of course preserving them as well as the memories they contain are a very important part of a wonderful wedding day. Who wouldn\\'t want to look back at all the white damask and brocade just to remember how they were as they first walked down the aisle to meet the love of their life? Properly storing a wedding dress after a wedding can help save the memories as well as turn back time.
What type of wedding dress do you have? Take note of the type of fabric, decorations, and lay of the gown before you go about choosing any type of preservation. There are historical wedding dresses from the 1600s still stored in the British Museum for posterity. These relics of a bygone era have undergone a preservation process that has taken money and time. You might not have such resources, but a few simple tips will have your wedding dress lasting for twenty, fifty, or even a hundred years down the line. Look at each of your wedding gown parts separately, are there metallic sequins or zippers attached to your gown? Metal when rusted can cause discoloration and ruination of any fabric on your wedding dress. Is it of an organic material like silk or cotton? Silk and cotton are easily decomposed and eaten by molds and mildews. Even synthetic materials like polyester and rayon can be worn down over time when exposed to certain elements.
Materials that are used to store a wedding gown can make the difference between a pile of moth eaten rags, and a well preserved piece of art. The plastic bag that the gown came in is not a good way to preserve it. While it may look clean and well preserved on a metal hanger, that plastic bag allows light to get to the dress. This light may cause a yellowish discolouration and could break down the delicate fabrics used in the wedding dress. A plastic bag is also prone to rips and tears, and although waterproof when new a plastic bag keeps moisture in with your wedding dress which encourages mold and mildew growth. It is best to store a wedding dress in an acid free wedding dress box.
A proper wedding dress storage box must be a rather good fit for the dress and most importantly it must be pH neutral as well as any material that wraps the dress placed in the box. Neutrality in the pH scale simply means that there is no acidity or alkalinity in the box material to degrade the fabric of the dress. Proper storage also means additional precautions such as pH neutrality, storing it in a dry, room temperature place that avoids great fluctuation of temperature or any sort of moisture. Moisture is what gives way to mold and other things that live on organic materials. Mothballs should be placed near and not within the box to prevent pests. These simple steps can preserve your dress for a new wedding day.
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