My husband's business shirts have frayed collars and cuffs. I don't sew, but I understand you can flip these worn ends and turn them around. How much should I pay? Would my dry cleaners or a tailor do this?
Add your voice! Click below to answer. ThriftyFun is powered by your wisdom!
I think buying new ones would be less expensive.Seamstresses aren't cheap. I know, because I sometimes sew for people. If you can't afford all new shirts at once,buy one or two a payday. Judy in alabama
Don't do it. As another writer says, it's too expensive. Even if it were free, you end up with cuffs and collars that are worn thin. You'd be lucky to get a dozen wearings before it's frayed again.
Elaress
This is a good idea, but only if you can do the work yourself for free. Its easy. Just unpick the seam. Turn the collar over. Then resew. Try it. You have nothing to lose.
Best wishes always,
Well, these shirts are very expensive and I think I'd like to try and save them.
I just wanted to know if they still look good after the collars are flipped.
It will cost 20 to 30 dollars or more to have this done.It is also NOT that easy unless you have some experience. It is not difficult to do but it is time consuming to rip out all collar seams and topstitching--and then put them all back.
Don't waste your time and money. If you look in thrift shops you can find wonderful, all-cotton, high -thread- count designer dress shirts if you look hard- and probably pay only $4-5. My Goodwills have been distributing scratch off tickets the last couple of years- some give an additional 10 or 20% off your next purchase. Also you can find discount coupons in the local papers.
Cuffs (French, at least) are fairly easy and will generally look quite presentable; here in the UK I pay the equivalent of USD10-12 for this service. Collars are more problematic and I personally won't have mine done - I have the collars removed and the shirts converted to take detachable collars at USD 4-5 a time. If you do have the collars turned, you may find two problems - firstly, if the shirts have set-in stays, you may find that the shape of the stays is visible on the (now) top surface of the collar, and even that that surface is wrinkled through not having shrunk as much as the top surface, or having more spare fabric built-in.
Anthony.
I've done it for years with my father's shirts, my brothers', my own. The cuffs are easier -- you just unpick them turn them over and sew them onto the other sleeves. Soft collars are easy too, as are button downs. As another poster mentioned, they stays might show, so just look before you snip.
If you buy all one brand of shirt, you can save the good collar and cuffs from an otherwise destroyed shirt (say one that is badly stained) and use them as needed later.
Guest poster Anthony of 2008's experience in the UK is much like my own in the same place. English shirtmakers in Jermyn Street, between Piccadilly and Jermyn Street in central London, used to replace (but not turn) worn collars of their own make shirts. Often, they would do so only in white cotton, however, regardless of the shirt's pattern. To have such a shirt's collar and both its cuffs turned was fairly expensive but still worthwhile with a Jermyn Street shirt because of their legendary high quality and durability. However, the charge for this service (now only provided by Turnbull and Asser and Hilditch and Key) is now so much higher it is prohibitively uneconomical on one of their merely excellent readymade standard cotton business shirts. It is about £100.00, not much less than the winter sale price of such a shirt. (That price is around the same as is charged for very good Western US country casual shirts in London.) The last time I had a few done, H & K took several months because they'd sent them to their makers in Italy, and then in each case a few weeks more to correct mistakes. They did, however, impressively, this time use fabric identical to the original lustrous cream cotton and, although the newness shows in contrast with the more worn-in look of the frequently washed original fabric of the shirt as a whole, the outcome was still satisfactory. With T & A, one of the shirts was made from sea island quality cotton, which is significantly more expensive than even most Jermyn Street shirts made from less luxurious material. In its case it was thus economical to pay the high replacement charge to extend the superior shirt's life practically to eternity. T & A were also quicker, because their shirts are still made in England and the replacement work is done by their own highly skilled seamstresses. To add to the achievement of both T & A and H & K, as a laudatory bonus, the shirts I last had salvaged there were so old they no longer fitted me.
These two shops may not appeal to visiting or mail order customer US citizens on tight budgets. They cater more to wealthy captains of industry and to others, like me, who are relatively impoverished but shirt quality obsessives. But their neighbours T M Lewin sell shirts of decent quality whose somewhat lower prices especially in quantity at sale times make them exceptionally good value items. They don't replace collars or cuffs but the wide range of collar styles and sleeve lengths add to their appeal even without a renovation service.
I agree with the thrift shop hunters. Ours tend to be charity shops. Their prices are no longer rock bottom but because they compete intensively the quality of the stock held in the better ones can be acceptably high. For example, within the last few months I bought a couple of Lewin shirts (one a blue/white gingham check, the other in pink) condition as good as new (no visible wear) in a charity shop (Cancer Research UK Islington?) for £7.50 each. They fit well. They are acceptably presentable. And if I outlast them I shall be a very lucky old man indeed!
But kudos to those of you with the skill, patience and loving-kindness to turn your families' shirts' collars at home. It's a dying art here, partly because of the snags so accurately described from experience in this thread, and partly from a lack of know-how, along with a throwaway mentality.
Add your voice! Click below to answer. ThriftyFun is powered by your wisdom!
