Tie Wrinkles?

[Quetzal]

Recently, I purchased a 1950s acetate/rayon blend tie from St. Vin's; it is a dark red tie with a motif design, but it is not as skinny as other period ties. Unfortunately, it has some wrinkles, and seems to "puff" when tied (although the fabric is somewhat wrinkly, the whole front blade seems somewhat warped). I tried to gently iron one edge, but decided to stop when those awful tiny "wrinkles-over-wrinkles-over-wrinkles" appeared on that side. Is there some way to remedy this?

-Quetzal

 

[fedoralover]

I have had great success by taking a spray bottle and misting them till they are damp and gently working the wrinkles out by hand. I've done with a lot of ties, silk and rayon blends. I've done the ironing too, but I've had the same problem of wrinkles over wrinkles when I do. Try the misting. I've done it on hand painted ones too and no problems with hurting the tie.

fedoralover

 

[Shangas]

Would a tie-press help at all?

 

[fedoralover]

Would a tie-press help at all?

I actually have a vintage tie press. It's shaped like a sword and you slide it inside the tie to iron it. I went to Goodwill and bought the most wrinkled tie I could find to try it out. It worked fine,but with some caveats. Many ties have a stitch that has to be cut to allow you to slide the iron in. Some may not want to do that. The other is, I still needed to dampen the tie for the iron to really work well. Also, if not careful you could still iron in more wrinkles. I found that by dampening the tie by misting I could get the vast majority of all wrinkles out without the use of the iron.

fedoralover

 

[fedoralover]

I posted these pics in the Ties thread but thought it would be good to re-post them here. This is a tie that someone was too lazy to untie and hence the wrinkles from it staying tied for who knows how many years were really set in it. By wetting it and working on the wrinkles by hand, and yes it takes a while, I was able to get 99 % of them out. If you do this make sure you wet the whole tie front and back. If you only wet the area that is wrinkled you will get a water mark. Also you want to take a soft rag, like an old T shirt and wipe it down as they can be quite dirty from years of hanging or lying somewhere. This one was really dirty.

BEFORE:



AFTER:


fedoralover

 

[The Good]

Wonderful! Was the tie actually soaked, or did you wet it gently?

 

[fedoralover]

Not really soaked, but misted heavily on both sides then wiped clean with a soft cloth and then worked by hand to get out the wrinkles. It wasn't wet enough for water to drip water off of it.

fedoralover

 

[LuvMyMan]

Ties make some people "leery"about handling and cleaning and ironing them. You can with ease, hand wash a tie in a clean bucket or even the sink. You have to rinse it like crazy to get all the soap and soap residue out of the tie fabric...then hang the tie to dry. You can help squeeze water out of it to help it dry faster and sort of shape it as it dries.....NEXT you need a cover clothe and distilled water and a steam iron. Cover the tie while ironing it, with a clean clothe cover. If the edges sort of "feather" a bit, just stop the steam and use the hot iron with the cover clothe on the tie. At times the steam itself can cause a tie to be all dill willy. That happens stop the steam on the iron and just use the iron hot but again use the cover on the tie.... This is how we do it here and it has worked for as long as I can remember.