Professional textile care symbols
The circle is not addressed to you. It is a message to a professional cleaner about which solvent to use — and one of its letters is not dry cleaning at all.
In detail
The circle is the only care symbol written for somebody other than the person reading the label. Its letters tell a professional cleaner which process to use, and the originating body says so plainly: they 'give information in particular on the solvents that can be used'. P MEANS TETRACHLOROETHENE — perchloroethylene, the usual dry-cleaning solvent — plus everything permitted under F. F MEANS HYDROCARBONS, the heavy benzines: a narrower permission. A BAR means a mild process, with stringent limits on added humidity, mechanical action and temperature. A crossed circle means do not dry clean. W IS THE ONE PEOPLE MISREAD, because it is not dry cleaning at all. It denotes PROFESSIONAL WET CLEANING — treatment in WATER by a professional, using special technology, detergents and additives. A bar means mild, a double bar very mild, a crossed W not at all. Why that matters is one sentence, and it closes the question people actually arrive with: the requirements placed on the professional equipment, the aids and the finishing methods CANNOT BE ACHIEVED IN HOUSEHOLD WASHING MACHINES. A W is not permission to wash it at home. It says water is possible in the right hands.
Why
- Laundry is explained by Professional textile care symbols
Where the care label stops being advice and starts being a specification somebody else has to read.
- Dry cleaning is explained by Professional textile care symbols
Sources for this page
Sources
Cleaning Processes & Clothing Care
Drycleaning & Laundry Institute International (DLI) · Trade or professional body
Relied on for: That drycleaning fluid contains little or no water and does not penetrate the fibres like water, and that professional wetcleaning is water in specialised equipment under precise control of additives, water level, temperature and rotation speed to prevent shrinkage, colour loss and fabric distortion. (states this directly)
GINETEX, The International Association for Textile Care Labelling · Standards body
Relied on for: That the circle covers professional dry and wet cleaning and its letters name permitted solvents; that P is tetrachloroethene plus all solvents under F, F is hydrocarbons, and a bar means a mild process with limits on humidity, mechanical action and temperature; that W is professional wet cleaning in water; and that its requirements cannot be achieved in household washing machines. (states this directly)