How often should a suit be dry cleaned?

There is no fixed frequency — clean when the suit needs it. For a suit worn occasionally, once or twice a year may be adequate. For daily business wear, once a season is more realistic. Over-cleaning degrades the cloth and construction faster than wear does.

Can I iron a suit at home?

With care, using low heat and steam, and never pressing the lapels flat. A pressing cloth between the iron and the fabric helps prevent shine. Professional jacket pressing equipment works differently from a home iron — it relaxes fibres with steam and then dries them with air, which produces a superior result without over-pressing.

How do I remove a shine mark from a suit jacket?

Fabric shine from over-pressing is difficult to fully reverse. Steaming the area and gently raising the fibres with a clothes brush can reduce it. For significant shine, a professional cleaner can sometimes help, but prevention is far easier.

What is the best way to store a suit for several months?

Clean it before storage — any sweat or oil residue will set and be harder to remove later. Hang on a proper shoulder hanger inside a breathable garment bag (not a plastic dry cleaning bag, which traps moisture). Store in a cool, dark wardrobe away from sunlight.

How do I keep suit trousers sharp between wears?

Hang them by the crease or fold over a trouser hanger — not folded over a bar that will create a sharp horizontal crease. If the crease has softened, a light press with a damp pressing cloth and low iron heat can restore it.

Man in a black suit jacket and white dress shirt

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How to Care for a Suit

January 19, 20263 min readBy Johnson Yu

A well-made suit is designed to last years, sometimes decades, with proper care. The key insight is that suit maintenance is mostly about what happens between wears and between cleanings — not about any single treatment. At our Maple Ridge facility we press and clean suits regularly, and we see a clear difference between garments that have been managed thoughtfully and those that have been stored carelessly or over-cleaned.

The Right Hanger Is the First Investment

A suit jacket lives on a hanger for most of its life. The hanger you use directly affects the shape of the shoulders, the drape of the chest, and the fall of the sleeves over time. A wide, curved hanger that matches the shoulder width of the jacket is the correct choice. Wooden is ideal; padded is acceptable. Wire hangers — common from dry cleaners — are not designed for daily use and will gradually distort the shoulder structure if left in place.

Hang the trousers by the crease on a trouser bar or clip hanger. Folding them over a single bar creates a permanent horizontal crease across the knee area.

Resting Between Wears

Wool and wool-blend suit fabric is resilient: wrinkles from a day's wear will largely disappear if the suit is hung overnight and allowed to rest. Body heat causes fabric to relax and retain impressions temporarily; hanging allows it to recover. Allowing a day between wears extends the interval between dry cleanings and helps preserve the cloth's structure over time.

After hanging to air out, a gentle pass with a soft clothes brush in the direction of the weave removes surface fibres and dust before they settle deeper. This is a two-minute step that makes a real difference to how fresh the suit looks at the next wearing.

Pressing at Home

If a suit needs a light press between professional cleanings, use steam — not a dry iron. The heat from a dry iron on wool fabric can cause permanent shine marks, particularly on the visible surface of the lapels, chest, and elbows. A handheld steamer held at a slight distance is far safer. Never press the lapels flat with an iron: the roll of a lapel is a shaped, sewn-in element of the jacket's construction, and pressing it flat damages that shaping permanently.

When to Dry Clean

Less often than most people assume. Dry cleaning is a thorough process but not a gentle one — it removes the finishing compounds applied during manufacturing and puts the cloth through mechanical agitation with solvent. Repeated dry cleaning over time degrades the fabric and can alter how the garment sits and drapes.

Clean a suit when it has visible staining, genuine odour from a long day or a warm event, or at the end of a heavy wearing season. Not because a fixed interval has passed. The garments that last longest are the ones that reach a professional cleaner only when they actually need it.

When your suit does need cleaning, we handle it properly at our Maple Ridge facility — pickup is free.

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Frequently asked questions

How often should a suit be dry cleaned?: There is no fixed frequency — clean when the suit needs it. For a suit worn occasionally, once or twice a year may be adequate. For daily business wear, once a season is more realistic. Over-cleaning degrades the cloth and construction faster than wear does.
Can I iron a suit at home?: With care, using low heat and steam, and never pressing the lapels flat. A pressing cloth between the iron and the fabric helps prevent shine. Professional jacket pressing equipment works differently from a home iron — it relaxes fibres with steam and then dries them with air, which produces a superior result without over-pressing.
How do I remove a shine mark from a suit jacket?: Fabric shine from over-pressing is difficult to fully reverse. Steaming the area and gently raising the fibres with a clothes brush can reduce it. For significant shine, a professional cleaner can sometimes help, but prevention is far easier.
What is the best way to store a suit for several months?: Clean it before storage — any sweat or oil residue will set and be harder to remove later. Hang on a proper shoulder hanger inside a breathable garment bag (not a plastic dry cleaning bag, which traps moisture). Store in a cool, dark wardrobe away from sunlight.
How do I keep suit trousers sharp between wears?: Hang them by the crease or fold over a trouser hanger — not folded over a bar that will create a sharp horizontal crease. If the crease has softened, a light press with a damp pressing cloth and low iron heat can restore it.