I always iron the cuffs and collar last. I iron the back of the shirt, including the pleat, then the front, holding down the button placket so as to get it nice and flat, then sleeve, then cuff, then collar.

I do collar first, then cuffs.

I do collar first. After that I forget. Hubby loved ironing, and he did it all. I haven't ironed in 16 years. :-)

I think that it's likely that the order in which you iron a garment stems from the days of flat irons when they were heated on a stove. The irons would be at a different temperature by the time you could get the whole garment ironed and would start with the part that required the most heat. The most delicate part of the garment would be done last when the iron was the coolest. With electric irons, even heat and different manufacturing methods and materials, it doesn't matter so much anymore.

B, C, D, A.........

Back when I ironed shirts I reasoned it this way. I did not want to wrinkle the back and fronts by twisting them around to get to smaller areas of the shirt. ( The shirt is most vulnerable to re-wrinkling when still hot or warm.) I did the collar and neckband first and then put the shoulders over the end of the ironing board and did them both. Then the sleeves and cuffs. Lastly, I began at the button band and rolled the body of the shirt around as I ironed so it was done when I got back to the buttons. Then it was gently placed on a hangar to cool.

Pretty much like Elizabeth....the body will re-wrinkle if you do it first, I have found.

Collar, left sleeve + cuff, right sleeve + cuff, left front, right front, back.

How funny. I do it opposite of Elizabeth for precisely the opposite reason. I don't care if the body gets wrinkled, that happens far too easily (as soon as you put it on!), but I want stiff and neat collar, cuffs, and placket.

Same as Elizabeth.

I unearthed my steam iron last year when I bought percale sheets. It takes me 20 minutes to iron three standard cases and a king flat sheet. Worth it to me!

When I push a button to give a blast of steam to a hem I think of my Scots-Irish immigrant grandmother who worked in a laundry in NYC from age 17. She *never* talked about her early years of poverty. She had to have wielded those heavy irons from stove to garment all day, six days a week, winters and hot, humid summers. I believe her widowed mother worked alongside her. Census records say that her brother was a "motorman" -- presumably on a trolley. (I have his 'gold' pocket watch.) Her sister was a nurse. Grandmother's entire family was dead of TB before she was thirty. My late mother had 'encapsulated' TB in one lung -- always a source of interest to young radiologists when she had a chest X-ray.

I do pretty much like Elizabeth using the same reasoning. My DM taught me.

I hate ironing! DH likes to iron and does his own. He will sometimes be conned into ironing one of mine if necessary although I have very few button up shirts that even need it.

I haven't ironed in years, but if I remember correctly, I did it pretty much like Elizabeth describes, except I did the back after the sleeves and cuffs, then the front.

Rusty

Same as Elizabeth and I learned that way in the military.

I always, back when I ironed....started with collar, back yolk, cuffs, sleeves then one side of the front and work my way around the back to the other side of the front.

One of my chores as a youngster was to iron my dads dress shirts. The shirts of my DH went to the drycleaners. When I worked I bought tops and suits that were dryclean only. When my sons started wanting things ironed I taught them sortakinda how to do it and then left them to their own devices.

I iron nothing.

ETA - mmm, that isn't what you asked, was it? However -, I do remember dampening them first and then rolling them up. Unrolling and then doing the collar first, then the sleeves and then the front, back, front.

I do it the way my mother taught me. Front band first, then put the shoulders over the end of the ironing board and iron the shoulders. Then the collar, the right sleeve and cuff, left sleeve and cuff. Finally the front, the back, and the other front.

My mother's family owned a dry cleaners, I guess that's where her method originated.

And I still iron as needed.

I really don't iron much anymore... mostly use the iron when I sew, and that is seldom too.

But I learned:

A Collar

B Cuff;

C Sleeve

D front and then the back.

No need for ironing shirts at this point in my life, but I would still do it the same way.

Moni

I mostly wear short sleeved shirts, and so I do not have cuffs to iron, but in either case, I start with the sleeves (or cuffs, if I have them) and use a sleeve board for this. Then I iron the yoke, the collar and neckband, the front pieces, and the back last.

I have also found that if the front and back are not ironed last that they can get wrinkled. I never iron creases into the sleeves, which is why I use a sleeve board. I also have a dressmaker's ham that I use for ironing curved items, especially when I am sewing. I've made quite a few shirts and blouses, although not lately.

"I think that it's likely that the order in which you iron a garment stems from the days of flat irons when they were heated on a stove. "

A colorful thought but I think this is most unlikely. That is so long ago, how would such knowledge have reached someone living today?

I too do it like Elizabeth. That method was taught to me in Home-EC class in the 1960s.

I think I learned how to iron from Home Ec.....back in the days when that was a standard subject for females (the guys took Shop). And we were taught collar and neckband first, then the shoulder placket, then sleeves and cuffs. The body of the shirt or blouse was always last.

I iron very little these days but I still do it in the same order. Some things are too ingrained to change :-)

I do collar, both sides, then I do yoke. Then I do cuff and sleeve, then the body of the shirt....one side front, back, other side front. A properly pressed shirt should not have a crease down the sleeve, so if I'm being very fussy, I press the top side of the sleeve down the center, then fold it in half along the underarm seam and then press the rest, leaving the top uncreased.

I do it like Elizabeth as well. Not sure where I learned it though- probably from watching my mother?

OK, OK. A couple of you have mentioned creases. Not wanting them. Yet, when a person purchases a new long-sleeved, french-cuff shirt, there are creases along the sleeves. Been there for a long time.

I wear my tuxedo 6 - 8 times each year. Usually with my jacket on; however, there have been times while 'dancing', I remove the jacket. Then folks can see the entire shirt. Yeah it is a bit wrinkled around the arm pits and back where I was sitting, but the sleeves and the front are generally in ship-shape condition.

Why no crease on the sleeves? There are creases on the pants!

I remember being taught (both by my mother and in home ec) to iron that top placket on the back first, then the neckband and collar, then the cuffs, then the sleeves, then the back and then the two fronts. The reason to do the large fronts and back is they will get wrinkled with all the twisting and turning if ironed earlier. I iron a nice shirt or blouse, thank you very much!

jim, for such infrequent use (presumably each time on a cruise trip), why not just take the shirt to a laundry/dry cleaner? Ask for medium starch and the shirt will remain reasonable looking for several wearings.

Jim, I think people mean creases other than the center crease on a sleeve, no wrinkly kinds of creases.

No, olychick, a properly pressed shirt should not have a center crease on a sleeve. Don't ask me why...just like don't ask me why the pleats in a cummerbund go up instead of down which seems so counterintuitive. It's just how it is...

Maybe it's because if you use a cleaner, you get a crease, but if you are wealthy enough for your own butler/valet, you won't have it!

Collar, sleeves, shirt.

Annie, the pleats in the cummerbund are there to catch the crumbs down the front of my husband's shirt.

Elmer, that works only if the person never perspires and baths daily. Otherwise, it's a crisp, but smelly shirt.

Even though I know how to iron a shirt and can do one beautifully, unlike my mother I always sent my late husband's shirts to the laundry. He loved the old Brooks Brothers very heavy oxford cloth (they don't make that anymore) and they were a bear to iron and he word 6 each week - sometimes 7-8, depending on evening engagements.

Collar, back yoke, cuffs, sleeves, one side of the front and keep turning the shirt until I reach the other side. DH actually gets compliments on his shirts! I iron a couple of times a week.

Collar, left sleeve and cuff, yoke, right sleeve and cuff, right front, back, left front, onto hanger. The collar and sleeves stay crisp while the body is being ironed, but the body wrinkles if I do it first.