Motivated more by penury than environmentalism, I recently decided to start washing all my clothes by hand. Towels, sheets, and blankets still go to the laundromat, since they’re too unwieldy to rinse and dry in the confined space of my little NYC apartment. Otherwise, I’ve kicked the washer and dryer habit, which is good, since both machines eat electricity like candy.
Feel like giving handwashing a try?
You will need:
- a large plastic or — better yet — metal bucket
- a bathtub
- laundry detergent (I like Seventh Generation)
- a laundry line, either in the bathtub itself, or anywhere else that’s convenient for you
1) Fill the bucket about halfway with your dirty clothes, packed loosely. Dump in the appropriate amount of detergent, fill the bucket with warm water. Allow the clothes to soak for at least ten minutes.
2) Take a shower. Wash, scrub, exfoliate, condition — do whatever you normally do in the shower. While you’re doing all this, stomp on your laundry to agitate it and force the soap through the fabric. You can also use a washboard during this stage, though I don’t think it’s really necessary.
3) When you’ve finished your shower, empty the laundry bucket and wring out the clothes. Fill the bucket about halfway with cold water, and then pound the hell out your clothes so as to remove as much soap as possible. Rinse, refill, repeat. Unless you’ve used way too much detergent, the rinsing process shouldn’t take more than a bucket or two of cold water.
4) Wring out your laundry, hang it up to dry. My laundry line suction-cups itself to the tiles of my bathroom wall, so that I can let my clothes drip-dry right over the tub.
Addendum: To shrink denim back to its proper size, soak it for five to ten minutes in very hot water. No tumble-drying necessary!
by laurawolfram
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I really like the idea of stamping on the clothes to clean them! It sounds much more efficient and effective than using your hands/arms.
It’s also much more fun.
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ingenious!
I too, am half past broke this time of the month, and can’t wait to have clean clothes again…patchouli only goes so far
I started this with blouses I wear to work, similar to above with variations. Live in a small city apt and dread the laundromat. benefits: soak longer in shower. I clean my shirts until the hot water runs out. scrub parts of the shirts: collars, cuffs under arms with a small plastic laundry brush. Let drip dry. iron press later. I don’t have to drive to the laundromat. Save $ on overpriced coin operated machines. save energy. Back/ shoulders/ hands/ wrists get a workout. Control how your stuff is cleaned. clothes aren’t get ruined: bleached or baked in public machines. I don’t need an electrical humidifier. drip drying humidifies the apartment air. good for my plants and my breathing in the winter.
I didn’t know how dirty clothes got until I began washing them in the bathtub. Even after one day’s wear, the color of the bathwater is gross, and the sediment left behind surprising, considering that I am a student and dont do much other than study and go to class.
As for drying methods, I have purchased a $20 clothes rack from Target, which is placed in the tub. Be sure to drape each clothes over more than one rung of the rack, otherwise the rack-even the better-constructed ones-will come apart. I have found it essential to have a fan aimed at the rack in order for the clothes to dry without mildrewing, which dry in about 6-8 hours.
I do this because I was paying $30 in order to wash my clothes at the laundrymat, plus $10 for a taxi, which was just frustrating, and expensive.
The only downside to this is that when socks dry their texture is unpleasant. Also, be sure to wash thoroughly otherwise you are essentially only perfuming your clothes with detergent, and not washing them!
Also, if you have a clothesrack placed in the tub, you should make sure that the rack is standing perpendicular with respect to the floor (that is, place something underneath the legs of the rack) since most bathtubs are slanted downward, otherwise your rack will lean slightly, and with all the weight on it, it will eventually become deformed
As a last word, I have found that washing clothes this way is a viable alternative to the laundry mat for a student, and if you don’t have a car it’s clearly better than the laundry mat. I wonder how many people do this in the united states/europe?
Started doing this in the ’80s, also for economic reasons, and it really saves a bundle. I even bought an album of Italian grape stomping songs at one point, just to add to the festive feel of it. We are brainwashed to think we need machines to do these things and we really don’t. Showering during the whole thing increases the efficiency of the operation. I like the collapsible stand-up drying racks that you can store under or beside a piece of furniture when not in use; I have two large racks next to a chair in my living room. I lived in Europe for years and although they do use washing machines (usually more efficient than ours) they tend to eschew the dryers and go for drying racks. One kind I really want to buy and install in the near future is the Leifheit over-the-shower model that you can lower to hang the clothes on and then raise up to let them dry. It’d be great for sheets, which I currently drape on two hangers and rearrange frequently to get them to dry. Glad to know others are doing it. My brother thinks I’m crazy!
Question about drying: how long does it take to dry with a shower rack? Is a fan used?
passt schon oder? :p http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ya1Ev1g9hKo very fitting!
LOVE this method. My 6 year old now loves “helping” with the laundry. We also use the grape stomping method in the tub though didnt think of putting it to music. I believe we will do this in the future. It started also when I didnt have enough change for the laundromat but now it’s just easier. I dont have to worry about my delicates getting burned if I’m not paying attention. I’ll have to try the in-the-shower method as well, as right now I’m not sure our “rinse” cycle is as effective as it could be. But hey, somewhat clean is better than ewwwwwwww…what’s that smell any day!! I’ve also traveled around Europe – mostly the former Soviet block and I’ve not once seen a dryer…washers yes but no dryers. I think partly it has to do with not having a way to ventilate out of those Soviet constructed buildings, partly for money reasons, but mostly because they’re just not as lazy as us machine dependent people…LOL nor do they have nearly as much laundry. Their wardrobe is drastically less bulky than ours. Everything generally goes with everything (even if it doesnt really go together) and it gets worn more than once before getting washed.
The defiinitely beats the laundry mat. I usually pay at least 30$ each time I go.
TIP: I wash usually most things in the tub and hang to dry. Usually my shirts and jeans are a little stiff – I go to the laundry mat and just do a quick tumble in the dryer to make my clothes soft. It’s an extra $1.00 if you prefer snuggle soft clothes!!
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i have never even thought of the grape stomping method! I’m moving to a space with a backyard (but no washer) finally so I am definitely going to try this out!
Ummm, is it just me or doesn’t anybody rinse the clothes and then give than a few minutes in water with some fabric softner so they aren’t all crunchy when they dry???
I just moved out on my own and currently only make money from selling partygalz products(if anyone interested contactme) and I dont have enough money to buy a big apt so my house has no way to hook up a w/d thats when I started doing this I do exactly what you said in the article except when the clothes are wet I spray a little febreeze on them to make them smell extra fresh and also so they dont smell like the outdoors. Thank you for posting such an amazing article you litteraly save me hundreds…lol
my mom used to do this with all our “nicer” clothes so they won’t stretch out in the washing machine (since we’ve always had the standard top loading kind and they just twist everything around). Now that I’ve moved out and am lacking money. I am giving this a go again. Laundromats are way to expensive. The only reason I would go is to use their dryer for towels so they’re fluffy
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Thank you so much for your pointers. I’ve been trying to do it in my nyc apartment as well! And couldn’t figure out how to shrink my pants back.
Our washer has failed us and I did not want to spend the day at the laundromat. So I actually looked up washing clothes in the bathtub and I had no idea that it is actually done all the time. My two girls 9 and 11 had a blast. We loved it and they have been asking if we can do more clothes.
Wow! This brings back memories for me. As a child, I grew up in a poor family and we had to wash our clothes in the bathtub like this. Only we didn’t use a bucket, we just filled the basin/tub with scolding, boiling water from the fireplace or gas stove and mix the lye detergent with some Borax. Then you put the laundry in, take a stick and agitate it. Leave them soaking for an hour then empty the tub/basin and pour cold water to rinse while stomping on the clothes. Our feet and toes were so wrinkled! Lol and Mamaw was able to give us a bath while washing clothes. Now that’s a woman! Haha
Senior w/ arthritis and cracked ribs so can’t get downstairs to use the building’s terrible and terribly expensive washer and dryer. Have to be careful of balance so won’t try the nice-sounding grape-stomping method mentioned to agitate clothes. Alternate agitator: our dollar store sells sponge mops for one dollar so I tried one as an agitator. Sponge part fell off immediately, so I duct-taped the metal squeezer part back against the handle and that left a perfect lightweight agitator with no sponge on it, which is working very well for bucket-loads of wash in the tub, and you can store the new “mop” behind the bathroom door, takes up no room. My problem is how to get the water out of the clothes well enough not to steam up my little apartment now in winter in Minnesota, when I have arthritic wrists? Was looking online for an oldfashioned hand wringer but don’t see any. The British centrigul spinners are too small and way too expensive. I intend to spend no more than ten dollars for a solution! Any ideas? I have some plastic milk crates I currently use to drip dry the worst of it, one upside down then one on top I just empty the bucket of clothes into, and wait. Will next try using a smaller milk crate inside the normal-sized one and pressing down, but again, the cracked ribs don’t allow much pushing. Silly problem, but I like clean clothes.
Many years ago in my 20s when we lived in communal house the guys swore that the key to washing clothes in a bucket in the tub was soaking. No agitating. They just soaked their dirty clothes at least overnight and did nothing else before rinsing. Didn’t wring out anything either–they just ran the heavy wrinkled stuff outside and pegged it on a line. But here it is twenty below zero this morning and no line anyway. I certainly am more careful not to spill food on my shirts so I can wear them longer each week! Handwashing makes you a neater person!
I have always used those bamboo garden poles set over the shower curtain pole and back into the corners of the shower unit in a V shape to drip-dry anything on. Very strong, very light, fairly pretty, and you can set them behind the bathroom door with the “mop” agitator (see my other msg just now) when not in use. They are just the right length to set diagonally.
This sounds like a great idea! I’m a student at a college where you have to pay to use the laundry machines, so this could be a huge money-saver.
Someone needs to invent a collapsible 2-roll- hand cranked ‘wringer’ (like what were on the top of washing machines in the 1940s) for apartment dwellers. It would be welcomed by many !