Karen Millen shirt - specialist dry clean? Really?

[UtterflyButterfly]

Perhaps I should have put this in Good Housekeeping, but I thought you knowledgeable lot might have some experience of this.

Just bought a fab white shirt from Karen Millen, wore it yesterday. Went to wash it today and looked at the label to see what temperature to put it in at and it says Specialist Dry Clean only! It's 68% cotton, 28% polyamide and 4% elastene. Surely I can handwash it ? What's the worst that can happen (other than ruin an expensive (for me) shirt?)

Any advice gratefully received.

Surely that could just be washed on a normal wash? I think they put DCO on just to give them no reason to exchange if someone shrinks it. I would wash it on a cold delicate machine wash as I am too lazy to handwash!

No real advice (i'm terrible at washing!), but i do remember reading a thread on here about a woman who took her karen millan dress to the dry cleaners to have it cleaned (as per the label instructions) and when she got it back it was ruined. It was almost like the damn thing just couldn't be washed without it becoming ruined. Whatever you do, just be really careful!

dexter , yes, I think shrinkage would be the only issue, so I'm going to give it a quick hand wash. It's not dirty as such (I managed to avoid spilling my dinner down it, thankfully), just worn for a day, so a cool rinse through shouldn't hurt I hope.

Freud I'm wary about dry cleaning too, as i've had less than satisfactory results.

OK, I'm off to the sink, wish me luck!

Good luck - I'm sure it will be fine!

Ok it will do well in a cold/like warm hand wash. Cotton and polyamide can take 30degrees quite well. Though wash by hand if worried.
Do not wring it, let it drip to dry over your sink/bathtub. Warm iron should wipe out any creases.

I wash clothes of this fabric content. I've not tried this with the brand of shirt you have. I would put it the quick wash on zero temperature & drip dry after a fast spin

I've handwashed in cool water and it's currently dripdrying over the bath.

I always check wash labels on knitwear etc, but it didn't occur to me that a white shirt would not be washable. It looks fine anyway - thanks for the advice.

it didn't occur to me that a white shirt would not be washable

I don't think this would occur to most people. It is fair to assume that a shirt can be washed. I can't believe KM would sell such a product really.

BTW I hand wash most 'dry clean only' stuff apart from coats.

Apparently it's the elastene in the material which MAY be ruined in a washing machine because if you wash it on too high a temperature then the elasticity will perish.

I have a gentle/hand wash programme on my machine and use that for all delicates, including dry clean only items such as yours.

KM clothes always say 'specialist dry clean only'. Drives me mad. I hand wash their shirts etc. as other posters have suggested, and the clothes have come up just fine.

My dry cleaner always makes me sign a disclaimer when she does my KM coats because she says she only does normal dry cleaning and doesn't understand what 'specialist' means! Never had any problems though. Just the usual retailer laziness.

I've got a white Gap shirt with exactly that fabric in those percentages. It says wash at 40c but I have often washed it at 50c just to get it extra white. I've had it 3 years and its fine.

I read somewhere recently that most modern washing machines don't actually reach the temperatures they say they do, so a 40c wash often only gets to 30c.

Agree with the above, I used to work for KM 10 years or so ago and over time they started adding dry clean only to so many clothes. I'm sure it was just to protect themselves if anything went wrong if they were washed. Obviously impossible to dry clean items that you wore to work frequently and almost everything that I wore that you would sensibly think could be washed was fine on a hand wash cycle.

I washed a very posh Karen Millen dress is the machine yesterday !!

(Not mine...I'm way to old, and not skinny enough) My daughter wore it a few years ago to her 6th form prom..got booze down it and shoved it in a cupboard!!! I found it and it said dry clean only, thought, 'what the hell...' and washed it on a coolish wash
It's fine and the 3 year old stain has come out! Damn shame it's a size 6 (or a tiny 8) and won't fit her or me now!

Looks like it's just KM's policy to label everything dry clean then. The label even said to put it in a delicates bag before dry cleaning !

Well,handwashed and cool ironed it's fine. I'm happy to handwash it - once I've had it a while and it's not so precious I'll probably bung it in the machine, I just don't want to take any risks with it yet.

I hand washed a Victoria Beckham shirt with six rosettes on the sleeves which was supposed to be specialist dry cleaned and ruined it. The rosettes frayed badly. I have sort of sorted it but it took forty minutes for each rosette. It was a present too!