How to Pack Your Fashion Pieces Properly

Like you, your clothes probably find any long trip a problematic proposition. Aside from the risk of getting misplaced, stolen at the carousel or sent to Vietnam instead of Vancouver, there's also that ever-present threat of wrinkles and creases. If your goal is to get to your destination in style, then wrinkles and creases present the greatest liability to your clothes.

Orders of Style
Whenever you put your clothes into any sort of container, you always run the risk of their getting crinkled, creased or otherwise messed up by being in the container. After all, fashion's natural habitat for any piece of clothing is a closet that's ideally big and roomy. You can't avoid them completely, but you can minimize the chances simply by putting your clothes into your bag in the right order.

Place heavy items like jeans and heavy outerwear at the very bottom of your bag. The weight of these items can create or worsen creases and wrinkles on other articles in your luggage. By placing them at the bottom, you avoid having all that extra weight on your lighter, more delicate pieces.

Conversely, lighter and more easily creased pieces are best left at the very top of the pile, or at least as far from the bottom as possible. In fact, things like pressed shirts - style pieces on which wrinkles would be positively hideous - must be placed at the very top of your bag. Putting them into your luggage at the last possible minute also helps because you minimize the time during which they could possibly get wrinkled.

Other style pieces that are okay when wrinkled (or whose wrinkles are easy to remove) can be placed at the sides of the bag to create a soft buffer for the more delicate ones in the middle. Undershirts, underwear, towels, knits and linen articles fall into this category. These things are wearable, even imperceptible even when they get all messed up in your luggage. Should they get too horribly scrunched, a quick steam-down at the hotel should take care of them.

Fashion in Fashion
The cool thing about men's fashion is that substantally large style pieces are ubiquitous and indispensable. From slim unlined blazers to hefty full-length overcoats, men's fashion has some bulk to throw around. One or two such pieces are all you'd need to make a big difference in the condition of your clothes once you unpack at the hotel.

Silk neckties, for example, simply must not be creased or wrinkled because they require professional care and handling. To minimize the damage of a long flight, roll up your ties and then stick them into the inner pocket of a blazer. If you have leather lace-ups on board, pop rolled-up socks into the toe area and a necktie at the heel; this protects your necktie and the shape of your shoes at the same time.

Blazers can also take a beating in your bag. To prevent the worst of the damage, turn your blazers and suit jackets inside out, and then quarter them lengthwise starting with the middle of the back. After you check into your accommodations, a quick session with a steamer (or a warm shower) should restore your jacket to its former glory.

Another alternative is to simply get containers for your clothes. A single garment bag should be good for a single set comprised of a jacket, shirt, pants and necktie. Of course, the bulk of the container usually creates an extra challenge for you, especially if you're flying somewhere cramped and crowded like the coach section of the plane.

Traveling with fashion in mind is a little complicated, yes, but it need not be completely impossible. You simply have to give some extra thought about what you can afford to get wrinkled and which pieces should be immaculate upon arrival. Once you've got that down pat, the rest should be a breeze.

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