In a masterclass on not sweating the small stuff, a man shared a hack to save his girlfriend's favorite sweats after they got a bleach stain.
The scoop
In a video made by Jake Polino (@jakepolino) and shared on Rit Dye's (@ritcolorcommunity) YouTube channel, Polino shares a fun way to save his girlfriend's favorite sweats.
"My girlfriend got a small bleach stain on her favorite sweatpants," Polino says over the video as he holds up her leg, showing the bleach stain, and gives it a thumbs down. "She thought they were ruined and was gonna throw them away," he continues, "but I wanted to put all this dyeing experience I had to the test."
As the video continues, he walks viewers through the process step-by-step. The first step is to remove all the color from the garment, which he says you can do using either a color remover or bleach as long as it removes all the dye from the garment and makes it one light, even color.
Next, you dye your garment by letting it sit in the dye water for 10-20 minutes while you fill another pot with a colorstay fixative. After it has soaked in the dye, move your garment from the dye pot to the fixative pot to lock the color in. Then, simply rinse and wash.
The final product shows a like-new pair of sweatpants sans bleach stains.
How it's working
Not only is this hack good for the health of his relationship, as he jokes in the video, but it's also good for the health of your bank account and the planet.
Buying new clothes adds up quickly, so hacks like these allow you to keep the ones you already have while keeping more money in your wallet.
They also keep clothes out of the landfill, which is a huge help to the planet. Thrown-away clothing is the top source of textile waste in the United States, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Earth.org further reports that over 100 million tons of textile waste get sent to landfills globally every year.
Once in the landfill, this waste produces planet-warming pollution. Not to mention that clothing manufacturing uses an enormous amount of resources, and when a perfectly usable article of clothing is thrown away, all those resources are wasted, too.
If you're not up for dyeing, visible mending or upcycling are other good ways to restore, reimagine, or repurpose clothing instead of throwing it away. Companies like Trashie also take old clothes and recycle them for you, rewarding you in the process.
What people are saying
Many viewers were delighted by the light-hearted video and thankful for the hack, while others shared similar success stories and alternate ways to cover the stain, like using a fabric marker.
"I was just going to ask about doing this very thing! Thank you," wrote one.
"A colorstay fixative. Didn't know about that, thanks," said another.
Another said they did the same thing to a pair of their favorite sweats, stating, "They look brand new now! It was fun and easy to do."
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