Savvy Tips: How to clean a Hermès (or any) silk scarf safely at home

I unknowingly developed my mother's love for scarves in the last few years.  She is one of the most elegant people I know and she often has a colorful silk scarf tied around her neck.  When I really started coming into my own and wanted to think of ways to give back to her, I started to look for Hermès scarves for her and developed my own passion for them.  As I mentioned here, I love the design and workmanship of these scarves and have a few vintage and more recent release scarves.

I wore my almost vintage "Quai Aux Fleures" scarf my first week of work at a new job and instantly got strange dark stains on it.  NOT cool.  It was either coffee or soy sauce (there was a lot of messy food that day) and I knew it would be hard to wash.  I was hesitant to take it to my local dry cleaners after having had other bad experiences there and was stuck.

But I remembered coming across this thread on TPF and this guide on eBay.  If other people had washed their beloved Hermès scarves at home, so could I!  I thought it would be worth a shot and was really pleased with the results.  I could not see any stains after I was done and the colors remained intact atop the white background.  I would highly recommend this method of washing scarves and yes, you can save your scarves!

Here are my simple instructions and a list of necessary equipment.

Items needed:

- plastic bucket

- lukewarm water

- delicate detergent (though I've heard dishwashing detergent works too!)

- large white towel

1. Combine less than a capful of Woolite or other delicate detergent with about one gallon of lukewarm water in a large plastic tub or bucket.  Completely dissolve detergent.

Note: You may also need to add in a color catcher cloth if you have many bold colors on your scarf

2. Put your scarf in the water and keep on swirling the scarf in the water emulating a washing machine spin cycle.  Do this for about 5 minutes (you can put on a song or two in the background to pass the time!)

3. Repeatedly rinse the scarf of all detergent and residue.  You may also need to do this for 5 minutes to ensure that the scarf is free of any detergent.

4. Lay the scarf on the white towel.  Roll up the towel so that it captures excess moisture from the scarf.

5. Iron scarf on silk setting.  It doesn't need to be 100% dry, but if it isn't dry, lay it out flat to fully dry.

You don't need to iron the scarf to bring back the scarf folds (if you like it that way).  Simply fold the scarf to fit inside the shape of the box and the folds will return!


Scarf with the stains

Scarf after cleaning

There you go!  You too can clean your scarves at home!