Caring for your clergy attire is an important part of maintaining your appearance during services and can ensure your attire keeps its colour and shape for a long time. Here are some tips you can follow to ensure the longevity of your clergy attire.
What are the Different Clergy Vestments?
There are many different types of clergy attire for you to keep clean and maintain, ensuring that you are always looking your best and no clergy vestment is left unattended to. Some of the different types of clergy vestments you will need to keep clean include:
- Albs – a long-sleeved, full-length white tunic won by numerous officiants in various Christian denominations.
- Cassocks – a full-length black clerical coat worn by priests, bishops, and other ordained ministers.
- Surplices – made from loose, white linen and often between hip length and calf length, commonly worn over cassocks.
- Stoles – a silk vestment worn over the shoulders like a scar and hanging to the knee, generally worn by priests.
- Chasuble – the outermost liturgical vestment commonly worn by priests.
- Maniples – though not as common in modern times, priests can still opt to wear this vestment, a tasselled strip hanging from the left arm.
The types of clergy vestments you wear and will need to clean will vary depending on what member of the clergy you are. Make sure to take stock of each liturgical vestment you own before commencing the cleaning process.
Caring for Your Clerical Attire: Tips and Tricks
There are a number of steps to follow when it comes to carrying out the proper cleaning maintenance on your various clerical vestments, ensuring that each one gets the proper care to avoid wear and tear that will damage your attire and affect its appearance.
Different Clergy Attire Cleaning Methods
There are a number of different ways you can tackle the cleaning of your clergy attire that will help you to remove stains, dust and odours without damaging the fabric.
You can check the care labels on your vestments to determine the right course of action when it comes to the cleaning process.
1. Dry Cleaning Clergy Attire
Dry cleaning your clergy attire is one of the most effective ways of cleaning your vestments effectively without causing wear and tear. You can hire a dry cleaning service or do it yourself at home to save time and money and still receive the same high-quality finish.
Dry cleaning your stoles and clerical robes the first time is also beneficial in setting the colours to help them retain their vibrancy for longer without fading.
Dry cleaning will remove odours, stains and wrinkles easily, leaving you looking crisp and professional at your next service.
2. Hand Washing Clergy Attire
Hand washing your clerical vestments with a mild detergent can also be effective for removing stains, so long as you keep the soap solution gentle and the water lukewarm to avoid any chemical damage to your fabrics.
Allow the stained vestment to soak and gently move the item back and forth in the water to loosen the dirt.
If your attire is stained, pre-treat the affected area before beginning the washing process. You can spot-clean the area with the soap and water solution, dabbing gently to avoid setting the stain deeper into the fabric. You can also use a non-bleach stain remover, just make sure to test it first to ensure it won’t discolour the vestment.
A lot of the time, you won’t need to wash the whole robe or vestment to remove a stain. You can spot-clean the stain as soon as possible after the accident occurs. Simply blot the area, apply one of the above-mentioned stain removal solutions, and then rinse with cold water before leaving it to dry.
3. Drying Your Clergy Attire
You have to dry your clergy attire with the same care and attention as the washing process. Some drying options include:
- Press drying – press the vestment between two towels which will absorb any excess water from the fabric.
- Air drying – one of the best methods is to hang the vestment somewhere where it can hang straight. Hang it in a well-ventilated area away from direct sunlight.
- Steaming – you can also steam your clergy attire to remove wrinkles effectively after the washing process.
4. Storing Your Clerical Attire
After cleaning and drying your clergy vestments, it’s important to store your clerical attire properly to avoid wrinkles setting in, helping you to maintain the appearance of each garment.
Contoured robe hangers will help you to preserve the shape of the robes so that when you go to wear them next, they hang properly on your body.
You should also keep the robes stored in a garment bag in a cool, dry place. This will prevent dust and odours from permeating the fabric, keeping them safe and protected from the elements so that they don’t lose their colour. Avoid folding the robes as this can create creases.
Things to Avoid When Cleaning Clergy Attire
The most important thing to do when cleaning clergy attire is to avoid any wear and tear. The fabrics used for clerical vestments are often quite fragile and so need to be treated gently to avoid any discolouration, damage, and ruination of shape.
1. Avoid Harsh Chemicals
Harsh chemicals can cause permanent damage to the fabric, causing wear and tear and discolouration. Avoid using any heavy-duty cleaning materials, especially bleach.
Mild soaps and eco-friendly cleaning detergents are the best course forward as these will have little to no chemicals in them, allowing you to get the cleanliness you need without any risk.
2. Avoid Ironing Clergy Attire
The heat from an iron can also damage fabrics. If your care labels specify no ironing, then it’s probable that attempting to iron will burn and damage fabrics instead of eliminating wrinkles.
If you do need to iron your clerical vestments, you can put a pressing cloth between the iron and the fabric to mitigate some of the heat going into your clergy attire.
3. Avoid Machine Washing and Machine Drying Vestments
Machine washing and machine drying cycles can often be too damaging and violent on the liturgical vestments, weakening fibres and causing them to lose their shape. The temperatures of these types of machines may also be too high, especially if you are considering washing the items with other pieces of clothing.
If machine washing and drying are unavoidable, try to do a low-heat cycle and wash the vestments separately from other garments.
4. Don’t Agitate the Clergy Vestments
When we say not to agitate the clergy vestments, we mean that during hand washing, it’s best to avoid any scrubbing or wringing, as these harsh movements can damage the fibres in the fabrics.
This links into the above point about machine washing as the movement of the machine can also cause harsher movements that the delicate fabric won’t be able to handle.
Keeping your robes clean and taking pride in your treatment of each garment will help to maintain your image and professionalism in church. By helping your vestments to last longer, you can save money and uphold the community you serve.
You can talk to us today to find out more about maintaining the longevity of your clerical attire and buy new vestments from our clergy store.
