My mother has shared with me a wonderfully useful handy hint from the 1950s. If you have jumpers, jackets or dresses in wool and other fabrics that you don't want to be laundering every time you wear them, you need to get some dress shields. These are little circular pieces of fabric of several thicknesses. You fold them in half and sew press studs on the under side of each half. Then you sew the corresponding half of the press stud onto the inside of the garment at the underarm. After you've worn the garment, you only need to launder the dress shield. (Unless you spill coffee down the front of yourself!)
I have used dress shields successfully with the jacket of a woollen suit, and I am planning to make some for my next vintage jumper creation. They are easy to make yourself. You only need to cut out two or three thicknesses of fabric - flannellette works well. Sew them all together with the zig zag stitch around the perimeter, and attach the press studs. Voila! Protection for your precious garments.
Who knew? I just did a Google search, and not only can you buy dress shields, otherwise known as underarm liners (yuck!), you can buy re-usable or disposable ones. What a long way we've come. I've never seen them in shops, but they are certainly available online. I plan to try out the stick on ones.
P.S. - 3rd February, 2013 - I found this fabulous ad in an old Vogue knitting book and had to share it:
So, yes ladies, keep your knitteds nice!
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