Tips for Getting a Suit on the Ship with few wrinkles

[ExilePA]

Just packing for my cruise this Sunday and realize I don't have a garment bag anymore. What are some tips/strategies everyone uses for getting their formal wear on the ship with fewest wrinkles possible without using a garment bag? I do have some of the Downy Wrinkle Relase, but don't know if that will help at all or not...

[nycruiser2006]

I leave the formal clothes right in the bags that they come back from the dry cleaners in. Then pack them last in the suitcase on top. It really helps with wrinkling.

[cali-croozer]

I went to a packing seminar at AAA and used their methods........a little hard to explain, but I'll try. Lay out the suit jacket and pants flat on the bottom of your suitcase, letting the arms and legs hang over the side. Go ahead and do this to any other pants (works for dresses too) you are bringing. Before you fold them up, pack the rest of the suitcase, rolling as many of the clothes as possible to prevent them from wrinkling too. Then, fold the legs and arms of the suit over and you should be nearly wrinkle free. On top if this, I usually have room for all of my/our shoes. I cut out a piece of sturdy cardboard the size of the suitcase and lay it over the clothes and lay all of my shoes on that. It used to be recommended that shoes go on the bottom of your suitcase, but now, with random TSA searches, it's recommended they go on top. I've had my suitcase, which was packed like this, searched by the TSA. Everything was placed back pretty neatly, except for one shoe, which they apparently couldn't get to fit back into my "shoe puzzle", so they put it in the outside pocket.:)

 

PS.......this is all explained in the book Travel Tips You can Trust by Anne McAlpin. She has a website too, www.packitup.com, but it doesn't go into this method.

[Cotton]

Put your suit into two thicknesses of dry cleaning bags. Pack it last.

[mrgabriel]

I had my husband's suit in a garment bag, but it still was a bit wrinkled. However, I unpacked it immediately and later hung it in the bathroom during a shower and the wrinkles came out.

 

I did take Downy Wrinkle Release and used it on a bunch of my cotton stuff, and it works REALLY well. You may need to spray and flatten a couple of times, and you will smell like Downy. :o

 

If worse comes to worse, you could give it to your stateroom attendant and have it pressed. But what the heck - everyone else is wrinkled too!

[Whimsy]

When we travel with dress clothes I have packed them with a dry cleaning bag on the inside, under the garment, and one on the outside. Our clothes come out wrinkle free.