I am equal parts passionate about saving money and saving the environment. I’m not always perfect when it comes to either, but when I find an idea that kills two bird with one stone, I’m all over that.
So let’s talk about your jeans. A study done by Levi Strauss on their 501 jeans revealed that manufacturing and ultimately washing a pair of their jeans produces 32 kg of CO2 during its lifetime {the equivalent of driving 78 miles in an average car}; consumes 3,000 liters of water {the equivalent of taking a 7- minute shower every day for almost two months}; and consumes 400 mega-joules of energy {enough to power a personal computer for 556 hours, or more than three months for six hours a day}. Wow. Just wow.
I already wash my jeans in cold water to save money and wash them as infrequently as possible, so now I’m going to jump on the “hang to dry” bandwagon {is that a bandwagong? If not, it totally should be!} in an effort to save a little more.
Do you dry your clothes on a line or in the dryer or a little of both?
~Mavis
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KAte says
I line dry everything. In nice weather it goes outside, in the winter it’s inside on a drying rack taking up the whole living room. It saves tons of money in terms on not running the dryer, and it extends the life of my clothes forever. I have t-shirts that I’ve been wearing for 15+ years. The only things that get dried in the dryer are socks and underwear, and only when I’m also running sheets. My clothes line isn’t big enough to support sheet sets, so they have to get dried in the machine.
I’m also with you on the not washing all the time. Basically I’ll wear jeans until they look dirty. If I don’t drop my lunch in my lap I can go a long time between washings. I’ll also often wear a t-shirt twice if I didn’t get it all sweaty.
Leslie says
I love using the clothes line to dry clothes when the weather allows. I have three lines in my back yard- two are 50′ long, and one is 25′ long- so I can dry lots at once. I have hung things to dry in the winter (when we were replacing our dryer) but it took so long! to dry anything. My husband doesn’t like how “crispy” his clothes, and our towels are after line drying. So after they are dry, I throw those items in the dryer for five minutes.
Cheryl says
I utilize door frames a lot! Drying my jeans means I then need a shoehorn to get into them, so I am fine with them on a hangar hanging on the door frame, same with my T-Shirts. But I also don’t like crispy clothes so they usually end up in the dryer for a bit before they go on the hangars. And too, the HOA does not like clothes lines…go figure.
Cheryl says
Oh and I forgot all the dog hair…the dryer removes most of that for me so I can hang them up!
Lisa Millar says
Regulations against line drying is totally out of my realm of experience, so I just went on a google adventure and was completely gob-smacked about the restrictions to line dry!!!
In an era where we should be so much more aware of our insane energy consumption, there are groups of people deciding that clothes drying on a line is not aesthetically pleasing and fine you for doing so!! Amazing!
I am trying to imagine anyone looking to buy a home, glancing at the neighbours undies and shirts flapping in the breeze and saying… oooooh no – I am going to offer $10,000 less because I don’t like the look of the laundry!! Who comes up with this stuff?? 🙂
I guess because in Australia, line drying clothes is so very much the normal way to dry clothes I never imagined it being a problem in other countries such as the US!!
Cheers!
Lisa Millar says
I have never owned a dryer – so everything is line dried or goes up on/in front of the fire! (or a heater in the past when we didn’t have a fire)
I love the freshness of line dried clothes and sheets. Our upstairs is very warm on sunny days so it makes a good airing room too…
The fire in the winter does an amazing job of drying everything. I have to move things about a bit, but I can only imagine the money we save by not running a dryer.
As for jeans… they don’t need washing that much! 🙂 And like Kate above, was so happy to learn that someone else wears clothes for 15 years!! LOL!
I wear my garden clothes several times before washing! Figure no-one is around to turn up their nose at me and it seems mad to wash them everyday if I am just going to be getting covered in dirt all over again the next day! 🙂
Jennifer Edgar says
I too hang most everything. I know it saves electricity by not running the dryer, but also saves wear on your clothes. When my boys were little I washed their clothes everyday, now that they are a bit older (teens), the school jeans can be worn a couple of days. I am a teacher assistant in Kindergarten, so my work clothes get washed after one day of wear. I always seem to find mysterious things on myself at the end of the day. Lol.
Rosaleen says
Our dryer broke over 4 years ago. I’ve refused to have it repaired. Everything is air dried here.
Lorraine says
I hang all underwear, socks and towels on a rack, since I don’t mind the scratchy feeling that air dried towels have. I put jeans, thirst and shirts in the dryer and then remove them a few at a time after 5 minutes. I hang everything up on hangers. Within 15 minutes the load is out of the dryer and hanging on a bar over my bathtub.. My clothes last longer and have no wrinkles. The money saved by not using the dryer pays for the hottub which is much more enjoyable.
Patty P says
We have a dryer, but we rarely use it. I line dry everything in the summer (love that line dried smell that the clothes get!) and I have a huge drying rack that I bought at one of our local Mennonite stores a few years back that I hang clothes on near our wood stove to dry. Every once in a while I dry the towels in the dryer in the winter, but otherwise, everything gets air dried.
Kari says
For as long as I can remember, all of our jeans and shirts have been mostly hung to dry. I pop them in the dryer for about 5 minutes, give them a good SNAP, then hang them up to dry. Done in this manner, I have only ironed clothes a handful of times in the last 25 years. This saves on the electric bill, prevents shrinkage of clothes, and keeps the ironing board shoved somewhere out in the garage. Our neighborhood’s CCR’s prevent clothes lines, so they all hang in my laundry room. I still dry towels, socks, underwear, bedding, etc.
Connie Wheeler says
We have always hung jeans and other heavy objects to dry. Also, anything that may shrink or delicate items. We have a wooden clothes dryer in the living room close to a heat vent and have a small heater we turn on if it’s really cold. Sure, takes time to dry them but you just figure on that. In the summer, clothes all dry outside. They smell so good !!
auntie M says
I use the air dry (no heat) setting on the dryer for about 10 minutes to soften things up and de-wrinkle and then line dry. I do this for all of our laundry, even towels. More work, but I need the exercise!
Lisa says
Depends on what it is. I grew up with line-dried sheets, and love them. But, I don’t have a line that big. I don’t line-dry jeans, I hate the stiffness they get that way. I would never line-dry towels or socks for the same reason. I line-dry in summer, and in winter hang the bras and my daughter’s shrinkable shirts on the towel rack to dry.
Kathy says
I found a folding wooden clothes dryer at a thrift store for about $3. It collapses so that it doesn’t take up much room and I actually store it beside the dryer when it isn’t in use. I unfold it and sit it up on the floor and it has multiple rods that you hang clothes on to dry them. I sit it under a heater vent and it doesn’t take very long for the clothes to dry on it.
I also have an umbrella type in-ground clothes line in the backyard of my apartment. A neighbor moved and didn’t want to take it with him and I asked if I could have it. I brought it over and pounded it into the ground near my backdoor. It has about 6 lines on it, doesn’t take up much room at all and you can hang at least two loads of laundry on it. I have no idea how much a set up like that would cost new but I would imagine it would be a bit pricy. I use it in the summer and I use the drying rack in the winter. I do use my dryer as well for some items. I always us cold water and have for many years.
Michelle says
Good Morning Mavis,
I like to dry outside, when I have the time and the weather cooperates, then finish in the dryer for a few minutes to get the clothes soft.
You should probably check with your HOA about a clothes line. Some of them can be party poopers about it!
Enjoy your day,
Michelle
Mavis says
We already know my HOA has party pooper tendencies! 😉
Barb G says
When I was first married we did not have a dryer. Everything was either hung on the line or a rack inside depending on the weather. 22 years and 3 children later I still use my racks and my line, although happily I do have a dryer to use in a pinch.
amy says
I spent a year in Israel and it was very common there for apartments to have an enclosed porch with clotheslines running along the ceiling. It was great. There was an easy place to hang clothes and they were out of the way. Could be a good work around for those with cranky hoas.
Mavis says
It’s always fascinating for me to see how much more energy efficient other countries are. We take so much for granted here!
Laetitia in Australia says
Like Lisa Millar, when I first heard of HOAs and CCRs preventing line-drying, I was amazed and appalled. The only restrictions like that that I think you’d find in Australia might be in apartment blocks and even then I think you’d get away with it if your balcony is big enough that you can have portable racks that can’t be seen from street level.
We don’t own a dryer. Since we rent and move every 2 – 3 years on average it’s simply not worth it because one can’t guarantee that there will be space in the laundry for one and then where does one put it? The only time I’ve wanted one has been in our summer (rainy season) when the air is super humid and we’ve had sheets strung over the backs of chairs in an (almost vain) attempt to dry them.