Ribbon wrinkles

[Twitch]

I just received this 40s vintage Stetson Royal Deluxe from an Ebay seller and find it in nearly new condition in original box. Seems that the ribbon is wrinkled in a couple places and I assume it's been in the box many years like that.

My question is does anyone have a way to straighten the ribbon out? Is steaming from an iron OK? I wouldn't want to lay the iron on for sure but wonder if spot steaming is harmful?

 

[Doh!]

When I recently bought my Jaxon Iconoclast, all of the ribbons they had in stock at Village Hat Shop were wrinkled from having the same size hats stacked atop one another (that's no way to treat a lady), so the girl ran it through the steamer for me. She did a pretty good job but because she couldn't eliminate them entirely knocked about $5.00 off of the already-on-sale hat.

In other words, steaming is pretty effective if not the cure.

 

[MattC]

Steaming and a hot flat knife

I took the wrinkles out of an old Mallory by steaming it up, then getting a flat dinner knife (not sharp) hot, and using the flat of it to smooth the ribbon over. Worked fine.

 

[tonyb]

I gotta try that hot knife trick. I assume you're advising that we use, say, a butter knife (better wash off the butter first, har, har) applied at an angle perpendicular to the brim? And how hot should it be? Would running hot water over the knife suffice?

 

[Art Fawcett]

Good idea Matt!! I always steam and hold the ribbon down with my hands. If that fails the only other solution is to remove the ribbon, recurl it, then sew it back on. More work than many will go through but then I hate wrinkles. ( though I've earned a few)

 

[MattC]

The hot knife

Yeah, a butter knife is the right idea. I hold the flat surface of the knife against the ribbon, not the edge, so that I"m smoothing the whole thing.

 

[Twitch]

Thanks guys! And to Tin Pan Sally who PMed me about the little steamer device Sears has

 

[Snrbfshn]

Say what?

What little steamer device at Sears?

 

[Twitch]

She said Sears sells a small steamer device that doesn't touch the fabric that she uses with good results. Might be worth a trip to Sears...after the holiday crazyness

 

[Solid Citizen]

A good hand iron with a steam button has worked fine for me on hat ribbons! Peter

 

[astaire]

Good idea Matt!! I always steam and hold the ribbon down with my hands. If that fails the only other solution is to remove the ribbon, recurl it, then sew it back on. More work than many will go through but then I hate wrinkles. ( though I've earned a few)

I had taken out a ribbon off from my Dobbs because it was so dirty, and i guess partly from fading. I washed it and thought of using the reverse side since it looks like new. When i tried to put it on, I realized that the top part was not going to fit nice and tight as the bottom part.

Art, is this the reason why i have to recurl the ribbon? How do you recurl the ribbon?

BTW, it is a grey Dobbs twenty which I was planning to send to Art before his "sad" post.

 

[RBH]

I assume you're advising that we use, say, a butter knife (better wash off the butter first, har, har) applied at an angle perpendicular to the brim?

Puts a whole new meaning to butter soft now,
dont it ?

 

[Art Fawcett]

yup Astaire, this is exactly why the curl is needed. I can go through the process with you but Dalexs has done that already in a link that I think you would enjoy. Can someone help us out with the link? I have a heck of a time saving these links & can't find it off hand.

 

[astaire]

Thanks Art and Duane

I've seen the page from Dalexs, but am i missing something? The page doesn't mention anything about recurling the ribbon.

Please help.

Thanks everyone.

 

[Russ]

Hmmm, I missed it, too. Anyway, I did find this information which might be helpful for curling ribbon:

http://www.lynnmcmasters.com/petersham.html
http://vintagesewing.info/1950s/52-hmh/hmh-045.html

The second link refers to this curling as "swirling" and the whole web site is very informative.

 

[Orgetorix]

I just used the steam-and-hot-knife trick on a new hat last night, and it worked pretty well. Not like a brand-new ribbon, but it's tolerably straight.