What most people don’t know is that it is actually not the heat that makes dress shirts smaller in the dryer. When shirts are manufactured they are typically stretched out to make more fabric for less. When these fabrics are finally being tumble dried they become smaller, but the reason for this phenomena is surprising to most people….
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Shirts become smaller in the dryer because they are bounced off the walls, not because of the heat in the dryer. In fact, the heat actually makes them larger.
Washing makes the shirt shrink
It remains true that washing a shirt, that has not been pre-washed by the manufacturer, makes a shirt shrink. The shrinkage increases with the heat of the water. Our suggestion: wash all your shirts in the safe zone… 30 degrees Celsius.
