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Review 5/19/2008
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I recently brought in my beautiful designer wedding gown that I bought second hand from a woman that had the same exact measurements as mine. It was pure silk and in excellent condition, except for stains underneath the train. So I took it to View Cleaners to have it cleaned.
When I went to pick up the item, I found several snags, with one very large and long snag right in the middle of my bodice!
The owner claimed that the damage was from my beading, and that beading often snags fabrics and apparently he uses a special bag for sweaters during dry cleaning to prevent snags...BUT NOT EXPENSIVE 5,000 DOLLAR WEDDING GOWNS!!! If this snagging happened so much, then why did his employees not tell me when I dropped off the gown?
On top of this, the fabric was ruined, they insisted that the dress had to be wet cleaned when I dropped it off and I didn't want them to do it because I was afraid that the fabric would change. But I figured, I they would know better than I, given that they're supposed to be professionals at cleaning and the woman who took in my dress told me that the person cleaning the dress (the owner) would know what fabric it was and would not wet clean the dress if it would damage it. Well, apparently he didn't and blamed me because there was no tag in the dress that indicated the fabric. I can't believe he made that excuse of that to me. If you don't know the fabric try to find out!! Don't just stick the whole thing in water and see what happens!!!
I was further insulted by his request that I PAY FOR HIS SERVICES! He said the best he could do for me was give me 10% off his cleaning fees...which was supposed to be $250.00 or he could try cleaning it again to reverse the damage from the wetcleaning (these horrible white streaks all over the dress and the total lost of luster of the fabric) which is ridiculous. Why would I let him "clean it again" when the damage came from his cleaning methods in the first place!
You would think that the more expensive cleaning fee that he charged compared to other dry cleaners and the fact that on their website they has atleast four pages dedicated to explaining how they supposedly are so experienced and careful in cleaning gowns, that they would be smart enough to know that my gown shouldn't have gone into the water and that the dress should have been put in the bag or the beading covered or removed prior to dry cleaning the dress. He has a in house seamstress working for him, and the seamstress could not have removed the beading from the dress prior to cleaning? That was something I (the non professional) was supposed to know? I only found this out after I was informed by another expert wedding gown cleaner I found through Saks Fifth Avenue after purchasing a new gown with them.
After taking him to court and him changing his story about the fact that my gown was damaged during the wet cleaning process he did NOT use the dry cleaning process, the judge ruled against me because I conveniently signed a waiver for the wetcleaning. Of course the day after the gown was damage he had told me and my fiance that he had dry cleaned it and that snags happened to beaded sweaters and he didn't have a bag big enough for wedding gowns. I believe his website has false advertising and he should not be allowed to clean wedding gowns, because removing the beading and knowing the type of fabric before employing a possibly damaging cleaning method should be common sense and responsible business behavior. Not doing so is considered negligent.
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