r/onebagging • u/kevin_jazz • Jun 13 '18
Discussion/Question Traveling with linen shirts?
With the summer upon us, I've been thinking about linen shirts for warm weather travel. When I think of linen, I also think of wrinkles--lots of them. I suppose linen should dry fast. Not sure about odor. Nor about its intrinsic UPF. However, they should feel great in the summer.
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Jun 13 '18 edited Sep 17 '18
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Jun 14 '18
I daresay linen long sleeve shirts with Airism undershirt is just as an comfortable as a cotton t shirt here in the tropics.
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u/Smashleyyyyy Jun 15 '18
I don't bother with the airism stuff. I don't ever know if I should tuck it in or not, and it constantly untucks for me anyway.
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Jun 16 '18
That's unfortunate, I can't ever go back to normal undershirts after discovering Airism. Theyre long enough for me that they don't really untuck either.
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u/kevin_jazz Jun 26 '18
I was wondering about that as I have Airism as well, but it seems like it defeats the purpose for linen....
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Jun 13 '18
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u/Smashleyyyyy Jun 13 '18
Do you kind of pull the shirt down on the hanger or does it just relax itself?
Honestly I travel with a steamer everywhere I go. It's an incredible quality of life improvement and the small handheld ones barely take up room in your bag.
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u/guy_guyerson Jun 14 '18
It will relax itself, but the vertical wrinkles won't come out as well as the horizontal ones.
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u/mohishunder Jun 14 '18
Huh. Can you recommend a specific model that is small enough to onebag?
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u/Smashleyyyyy Jun 14 '18
Steamer For Clothes by LAPUTA, Clothes Steamer, Perfect For Travel / Home. Amazing Handheld Garment Steamer, Powerful, 60 Seconds Heat-Up, Fabric Steamer with Automatic Shut-Off Safety Protection https://www.amazon.com/dp/B075294YR6?ref=yo_pop_ma_swf
I carry this one with the cord wrapped around itself and the top part disassembled to make the whole package more malleable in my luggage. I just keep it in a small eagle creek lightweight cube. Depends on how light of a bag you carry but I’ve had no problem fitting it into anything from a goruck GR2 34L up to my current tortuga outbreaker 45. The curve makes it kind of tuck away in the corner of a bag where it doesn’t eat up that much space, or you can kind of ‘wrap’ it around other pliable soft stuff like a packing cube full of underwear.
Amazon has a ton of identical models but this is the specific one I bought a few months ago.
It’s seriously such a huge quality of life difference that i get mad at myself when I forget it.
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Jun 13 '18
I used to have one, but threw it out. The wrinkles were the main problem, but it also started smelling rather quickly. I'm wearing 90% Uniqlo Heattech shirts now, they're great.
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u/yqlin Jun 22 '18
If wrinkles bother you that much, then linen is not for you. In my opinion, they look great rumpled, and since almost everything rumples in a tightly packed suitcase/luggage, you might as well go for a fabric that's meant to look like that.
I've found linen very practical for tropical travel (Sri Lanka, Cuba, SE Asia, and as a girl from the tropics, I wear linen items frequently because it's the most tolerable way to stay dressed in our disgustingly humid weather.
Linen dries reasonably fast, certainly faster than cotton and laundering is fuss-free - it's durable and doesn't require any special care. I wouldn't put it in the dryer though -- it'll likely shrink. Compared to cotton, they retain odour to a much lesser degree.
Linen is always gonna wrinkle once worn, but the thinner and "crispier" the linen, the more they rumple. You can try heavier weight linen (where the light doesn't shine right through so much when you hold it up). My best affordable linen comes from Muji - they don't seem to rumple as much (lots of pre-washing maybe) and they last for years.
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u/kevin_jazz Jun 22 '18
Thanks for the response. How do you care for when you’re on the road? Do you carry an iron, or just depend on the hotel? Or do you just roll with wrinkles?
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u/yqlin Jun 26 '18
I just roll with the wrinkles. hanging it up makes hell of a difference. the suggestion from one of the commenters to spray/sprinkle some water and let it hang dry overnight is also quite effective if you have the time, but with my heavier, very well-worn linen, I don't find it necessary!
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u/wordfool Jun 13 '18
I limit my linen to perhaps one shirt that I don't mind wearing wrinkled and I take only for linen's unsurpassed "breeziness" (for want of a better word). I have a pair of cotton-linen shorts that are pretty airy, too, and look a little less rumpled.
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u/mustelafuro72 Jun 16 '18
I have purchased a couple of them. After first washing it was clear I could not think of wearing it without ironing. So I must admit even if they are great for summer, I am going to stick to other fabrics. In particular I use tencel/merino tshirts. They don't need ironing.
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u/-Nepherim Jun 30 '18
I like the Banana Republic linen shirts, both at home and travel. They often have 40% off sales, and their stuff seems to hold up well. Personally I just wear them without ironing. For me that look works well with jeans in most causal settings. Worst case dampened, with a heavy book on top of the button areas helps with the worst wrinkles.
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u/_chris_sutton Jun 13 '18
I’ve found that my Myles shorts make for a pretty good “iron” without any heat. Fold them tight into a ball, wet the front then use to iron my linen shirts and let them hang for an hour. Can remove any major creases you may have introduced with packing and gets them as close as needed to wrinkle free for being linen.
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Jun 15 '18 edited Mar 30 '20
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u/DarumaRed Jun 27 '18
Do you wear an undershirt under them, like a UNIQLO Airism or something similar?
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u/ZweitenMal Jun 13 '18
Linen that's well broken-in wrinkles less. Spend a little time learning to roll/fold well and be prepared to hang your shirts in the bathroom while you shower and you should be fine. Also, it's linen. A certain amount of wrinkling is part of the look.