Removing mothballs smell from vintage fedoras?

Lord Stirling said:

Hey everybody,

I recently purchased a couple vintage fedoras in great condition off of ebay, and unfortunately they smell like mothballs, lol

Does anybody have any tips for removing the mothballs stench from delicate vintage fedoras made of heather, wool or fur felt?

Thanks.

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LuvMyMan said:

Real easy fix here. You need a very large lawn sized garbage bag. One plastic sandwich bag. Purchase some ground coffee that is Vanilla Bean, you do not need much at all. If you have a hat box you normally store the hat in, or can put the hat in a hat box with the crown side down, this is going to help. However all you need to do is carefully place the sandwich bag open side up, with a healthy amount of the vanilla bean coffee in the sandwich bag, directly in the very center of the inside of the crown of the hat and slide everything slowly into the large garbage bag. Be careful you do not let the coffee grounds spill into the hat. Tie the large garbage bag closed and leave it for at least 24 hours. The coffee grounds will give off some of the vanilla bean smell, and absorb the smell of the moth balls. After you take the hat out of the large garbage bag and it is worn or just stored you will notice the vanilla bean coffee smell will slowly go away.


I have done this to a few hats and it has always worked for me.

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1mach1 said:

Wow. Thanks for sharing that tip, Cindy!

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