Cleaning a Dirty Fuzzy Cap — FranchiHatz

Before you realize it, your hats are going to start getting messy, linty, hairy, dusty, and more.

After all, you may put down your hat in your car, on your table, chair, workdesk, sofa, backpack, and a dozen other places. Not to mention every time the hat falls on the floor, car floor, restaurant floor, etc. Even at home on a shelf, rack, or closet your hat will eventually start collecting dust and whatever floats through from the fan, window, or air-conditioner. And if you have pets, you may not realize the reaction your extra hairy hat give others.

So after a while, your weekly go to hat starts to look like a last-resort mess. And while a good wash may help it smell better, it may actually make it hairier and fuzzier.

What collects on your hat?

Several things can make your hat look dirty.

• Fuzz
• Dust
• Your hair or other people
• Pet dander and pet hair
• Loose threads
• Other stuff from a floor or bag
• Clingy static items
• Larger chunks from your work environment

Does this hat have any life left?

Maybe your hat isn’t special to you?

• Was it a free giveaway?
• Does it have a silly phrase or message?
• Has a brand logo you don’t care for?
• Is it falling apart?
• Has it completely lost its shape?
• Is the material ripped?
• Are there multiple threads coming out?
• It has impossible to remove stains?
• Is it more than five years old?
• You have no special memories with it?

If your cap meets one or more of these criteria, then it may be time to store away, donate, or trash your hat.

Saving a dirty but good hat

If you like your hat and it’s not a total piece of junk, there a few steps you can do to save and repair your hat.

This article is focused on some of the easy quick wins you can do to save your hat. We’ll start off with a good cleanup all around the hat.

After that, if we need to, we’ll get more serious about dirt spots, stains, smells, and shape.

In most cases, you should be able to clean it up and enjoy your fav cap for another year or so.

Let's cleanup this baseball cap full of lint

In our example, this popular cotton baseball cap has fuzz, lint, hair, and random strings all over. It’s almost getting embarrassing wearing this hat, but it keeps getting used and moved around the house, backpack, and car.

Most of this will apply to baseball caps, dad caps, and even trucker caps. If you don’t know the difference read Baseball vs Trucker caps.

So lets dig in!

How to remove lint from hats?

There are two main types of tools you will want to use to remove the ugly fuzz from your hats.

A) Some sticky tools to grab and remove the unwanted stuff of your hat.

B) A brush to remove the unwanted stuff off your hat.

Lint rollers

Lint rollers for clothes are the best way to clean fuzz off of a cotton, felt, or wool hat. Just like clothes, you prepare the roller with a clean sheet by tearing off the old sheet. Then you roll over your material to pick up fuzz like lint and loose string.

If you don’t have a roller, you can use normal scotch tape or even painters yellow/blue tape. To do this efficiently, you would pull out a long enough piece and maybe wrap it around your hand. Then tap around the material to pick up lint.

Lint brushes

In some cases, you may want to use a lint brush or even a toothbrush to comb over the hat and brush away junk on the hat. Some materials are better suited for brushes or if you want to move a few loose things it may be faster to brush off the loose hair or cotton fuzz.

If you do use a toothbrush, try to use an old fashion toothbrush made up of mostly bristles without all the rubber gum cleaners add ons.

Cleaning the cap crown

Place your hat upright on a table, or hold it with one hand holding it from the inside.

Prepare your lint roller with a fresh sheet.

Begin by rolling up from the bottom up to the top. Roll over each panel up and down several times.

Rotate your hat or hand to see and clean the next panel.

If you need to go over the bumps like ventilation eyelets, panel seams, and button tops using different angles to clean all the nooks and crannies.

How dirty did your hat get

You may not have realized how dirty your hat is until you start cleaning it. In fact, you may even go through a few lint roller sheets — and that's ok! You may want to focus one clean sheet on just the front, then another for the back, another for the sides, and one final one all around.

Remember that after you clean the hat a bit, the stickiness goes away. So be generous and use multiple lint sheets (or tape) to grab all of the junk off the hat.

Do hats get dirty on the inside?

Yes, you do need to clean the inside of your caps. They have hair, lint, loose strings, and other miscellaneous fuzz. While people may not see inside your hat, anything inside your hat crown will end up on your head and hair once you take off your hat. So it’s best to clean the outside and the inside of your cap.

Cleaning the inside of the hat

Before you clean the inside of the crown, start with a fresh lint sheet. Setup your cap upside down with the crown facing down. You will want to use the roller several times on each panel. After each panel rotate the hat so you can clean the next panel.

You may also want to hold the crown with one hand while moving the lint roller inside the crown with the other hand.

Don’t forget to also clean the panel seams and any branding tape on the seams.

The sweatband around our head

In addition to the crown cleanup, you need to clean the sweatband that sits on your forehead and is at the bottom of the entire inner crown. This will also remove any lint or fuzz that may get left on the back of your head, so nobody is laughing at the back of your head.

To clean the sweatband, hold the lint roller in the opposite direction of the sweatband like a + symbol. Begin rolling the lint roller on top of the sweatband several times. Then rotate the hat, and clean the next part of the sweatband. Eventually, you will have cleaned the entire 360 degrees of the sweatband.

Cleaning the cap bill

While the bill has a hard layer under the cotton fabric, it still gets fuzzy and dirty.

The top of the bill or visor is usually more visible on baseball caps and the bottom of the bill may be more visible on trucker caps.

For both the bill and the under bill, setup the roller to go across the bill as seen in the picture. Then roll it back and forth a few times.

If you’ve collected enough junk, rip off the dirty lint sheet.

Don’t forget to clean both sides of the bill.

Can I vacuum a hat?

In some cases, it may make sense to vacuum all around a hat.

If possible, start off with a small hand-held dustbuster vacuum.

You can even try an air spray can, like those used to clean computer equipment.

Finally, you can use the nozzle of a rug cleaner on your hat. We don’t recommend using the bottom of a floor vacuum on your hat because it’s dirty and your hat and vacuum may get destroyed if it gets sucked in.

Can I use a lint roller on nice hats?

Yes, you can use a lint roller to clean up nice felt and wool hats like — Fedoras, Trilbies, Porkpies, Ivy’s, and Newsboys. You can even use it on casual hats like Beanies and Bucket hats.

However, a lint roller doesn’t make much sense for leather hats like western hats and outback hats. It also won’t work too well for straw hats like latin fedoras, trilbies, and panama hats.

Can I wash my Baseball cap?

Yes, you can wash your baseball cap to clean a more stubborn buildup or if your hat is starting to smell like sweat.

But first, let's start off with a warm wet rag dipped into some non-bleaching detergent.

Let it soak for a while — like a 2 to 4 hours.

If this didn’t clean your hat, you can consider putting it in the washing machine on a gentle cycle. Also, add some other safe similar colored clothes that won’t stain your hat. Don’t put your white hat in a load full of reds. And avoid mixing materials, don’t put your cotton cap in a load full of wool blankets.

You can even order a plastic baseball cap protector to put your hat in before turning on your washing machine. This will help keep the bill firm, while washing your precious cap.

My cap is out of shape!

If your baseball cap is out of shape you may be able to save it.

You may be able to use a clothing starching or stiffening spray to firm up the crown of the hat.

You may be able to iron the front of your crown to repair its front shape. Please use a light cloth to not iron directly on the front of your hat. You can also angle the iron to iron the inside front and sides of the cap.

How to handle wild hat threads

You may find yourself combing over old threads that are still attached.

This is a good time to use a pair of scissors to cut any loose threads on the top, sides, front, or inside of the hat. You can use paper scissors or smaller grooming scissors.

Cut close enough to remove any silly strings that will be obvious to people looking at you, but don’t cut too close that you break the fabric or break where the thread is fastened to the material.

How to store your hat

Now that you have an almost new hat, you’ll want to be a bit smarter about where you store your hats. This way you can avoid junk building up on your hat, as well as to keep your hat in good shape.

Here are some good storage ideas:

• Wall hanger or rack
• Over the door rack
• Plastic storage bin
• Closet pole or on a hanger
• Umbrella rack or hat/jacket pole
• Shelf
• Hat box
• Plastic bag
• Hat/Wig stand

Conclusion

With the right tools, you can really make your favorite hats look brand new. You probably already had a lint roller, brush, and some clothing sprays in your bathroom/closet.

This maintenance will help your overall look so that you look amazing and also have that cool cap that is broken in and defines you with style.

Bonus Tip — Maintain your essential accessories

This is a good lesson to periodically take care of your suits, ties, and shoes. As well as to replace your belts, handkerchiefs, underwear, and socks.

You may want to set a calendar reminder, or just like changing smoke alarm batteries when daylight savings changes. This way annually you will review, fix, or replace your essential accessories.

Keep yourself stylish with a little maintenance!

Originally published at https://www.franchihatz.com on April 4, 2021.