Many brides have asked us about what is a Green Dry Cleaner and particularly as it applies to wedding gowns. These questions have been good ones. We at Iris City Cleaners and Iowa Bridal Preservation take great pride in having included in our day to day work activity which truly represents sustainability of our planet. We conserve energy in every way we can, we buy products which are good for both our planet and ourselves, and we behave in a conservatory way to implement these initiatives. We have been recognized nationally for our efforts by the Green Cleaners Council and currently the only one in Iowa Certified as a Green Cleaner with a distinguished 4 Leaf designation, Glen Green - A Colorado Based conservatory group, The Des Moines County Waste Commission, and the Association of Wedding Gown Specialists for our work. Are a Proud partner of Carbonfund.org. The Dry Cleaning and Laundry Institute in hanger recycling, and the list goes on. But... When it comes to wedding gown cleaning and preservation, here is what we do to ensure the beauty of your special gown and safeguard our planet's future.
We at Iowa Bridal Preservation inspect all aspects of your gown for damage, seams in need of repair, bustle fasteners needing re sew, buttons missing, and plan those necessary repairs and modification.
We take measurements, analyze fabrics, dyes, and weaves, and note ornaments and their composition. This helps determine which preservation techniques and cleaning methods are the best for your dress, so that fabrics retain their shape and color, and embellishments (beads, sequins, and other trimmings) remain affixed.
We hand clean the gown where any level of staining is apparent.
We employ an ultraviolet light to help identify stains that are not visible in an ordinary light spectrum.
We identify those stains for eventual treatment.
Your gown is then either cleaned by one of our aqueous processes or dry-cleaned in our eco friendly solvents. Air Dry as needed.
Our solvents and both earth and people friendly.
We inspect again for anything needing special attention.
We include in our processes an anti-sugar treatment to protect against yellowing.
We are the first in the industry to offer carbon-neutral wedding gown cleaning and wedding gown preservation, and our ZeroCarbon™ gown preservations are unique. Only a MuseumCare™ wedding gown preservation from a Certified Wedding Gown Specialist™ is true protection for you and your bridal gown.
We asked Carbonfund.org, the leading nonprofit provider of carbon offsets and climate solutions, to help us calculate the carbon footprint of the process of cleaning your wedding gown and preserving your wedding gown. We included everything that goes into the process of cleaning and preserving your wedding gown from your trip to and from one of our Certified Wedding Gown Specialists™ to the cleaning procedures to the wedding chest's manufacture.
We account for the carbon footprint of your wedding gown preservation with our donations to Carbonfund.org, the leading nonprofit carbon offset and climate solutions organization, and Carbonfund.org uses our donations to help fund reforestation projects worldwide.
We select only materials which meet our standards of Museum Quality™ for enveloping your gown in our preservation. We use only acid and lignin free material for all of our preservations.
We do not seal your preservation chest because we want you to periodically inspect your gown and for doing so we provide you a pair of new white cotton gloves.
We do not store anything in your preservation chest which will emit fumes, acid, and alkalinity such as foam padding, shoes, etc, all of which are preserved and stored separately.
We offer our brides the opportunity to have her gown inspected and repressed at over 500 locations worldwide should the gown be worn again for family or friend. We provide you an international guarantee against discoloration of your gown.
We offer our brides an authentic silver six pence as an opportunity to bring to her wedding something of nostalgia and history with the belief that... and a silver six pence for your shoe, (left shoe) will bring good luck and fortune to her family.
We offer our brides a Bridal Emergency Kit to help with the little things gone wrong on her special day.
When you choose one of our Certified Wedding Gown Specialists™ to give your beautiful gown the care it deserves, you also choose to help safeguard the future of our planet.
So now you have it and we At Iowa Bridal Preservation are very proud of our work and our processes. We represent truly archival quality museum care™ in handling your gown. Heirloom Gown Preservation and Vintage Gown Restoration is something we do very, very well.
