What to do if your pants shrink after washing?

Probably, many have had to deal with such an unpleasant phenomenon as shrinkage of clothes after washing. Once you violate the care rules indicated on the manufacturer's label, you can say goodbye to the item, because its size becomes smaller. Today we’ll tell you what to do if your pants shrink after washing.

Pull by hand or with a weight

There is not yet a single correct method to help restore shrunken items to their former appearance. But don't despair. A way out can always be found. To begin with, it doesn’t hurt to study the characteristics of the fabric from which the trousers are made. If it contains wool, you can try stretching the fabric.

The following procedure will help you lengthen your trousers:

lower the item into a container of warm water and leave it there for a few minutes;
take it out and let the water drain;
Lay out the affected trousers on an ironing board or other flat surface, trying to stretch them by hand, and leave until completely dry.

There are other stretching methods:

The trousers are soaked, but not laid out on the table, but put on the naked body, having first hung a weight on each trouser leg. Remove after drying. This method of saving clothes can only be used in the warm season or in a well-heated room;
soak the trousers in an aqueous solution of hydrogen peroxide for an hour, after which they are removed and stretched by hand;
hang the item up (it’s better to use something stronger than a clothesline for this, such as a horizontal bar) and forcefully pull both legs at the same time several times. You can tie a weight and leave it until it dries.

Important! Before stretching your trousers, never wring them out.

An iron or chemicals will help

If the fabric does not contain wool, it is unlikely that it will be possible to lengthen the trousers using regular stretching. In this case, it makes sense to try to restore the item in a different way. Experts recommend: iron

iron the wet item with a hot iron and steamer, while stretching the fabric with your hands;
put the trousers in a solution containing water, ammonia, turpentine and vodka for half an hour. As an alternative to a complex composition, you can use soda and water. Only in this case you will have to soak the item for 12 hours. After the procedure, the trousers should become longer.

Carefully! Do not leave the product in the solution longer than the specified time.

Why does the thing shrink?

After washing the trousers became short. Why did it happen so? There may be several reasons:

The temperature is too high during washing. Hot water disrupts the fiber structure of the fabric, causing pants to shrink. Compliance with the care instructions for the item indicated on the manufacturer’s label will help prevent the problem;
high washing intensity, resulting in deformation of the fabric fibers, in particular, their compression. Wool trousers especially suffer from this. So that you don’t have to think about how to return the shape of a damaged item, be careful when setting the speed of the washing machine. Better yet, use the delicate wash cycle;
specific features of the fabrics from which the item is made. For example, silk trousers require very careful handling, because silk is most at risk of shrinking after washing.

As you can see, it is possible to cope with such a problem as fabric shrinkage.However, it is easier to prevent any trouble than to fix it. Therefore, take care of things correctly.