Dappered Classics – How to do laundry. A man’s guide.

I disagree with a few things here.

Firstly, you don’t need a dryer. Just hang things out in the air. It’s much better on the clothes, and on the environment. If it’s not sunny enough outside, buy a clothes rack and hang the clothes in your living room.

Secondly, you can wash anything on a cold cycle.

Thirdly, if you’re living with a lady, ask her what her system is, learn it, and offer to wash her clothes. Infinite bonus points if you do it reasonably.

The thing with new washers is that not only do they look cool, they’re EXTREMELY water efficient… your water bill will decrease significantly if you have one of these puppies.

Instead of a dryer sheet, you can take a couple of sheets of aluminum foil and wrap into a ball. Use that in the dryer to remove static. Don’t use fabric softener. We had our washing machine repaired and the repair guy said that the easiest preventable issues with washers had to do with fabric softener that is not really necessary. He said you can buy a detergent with some fabric softener included but the extra stuff you put in just gums up the parts. I no longer buy dryer sheets either as the aluminum ball does the job and can be recycled in 4-6 weeks.

@Markus: For simplicity’s sake (although maybe not accuracy’s) sake, I usually refer to dress button ups as oxfords. A “Button up” to me is more casual. Usually worn untucked. I do see what you’re saying though about how it’s confusing (oxford cloth oxford, vs… non oxford cloth oxford? Is that really possible?) It’s kinda how most lace-ups are called oxfords this day, vs. bluchers. I myself am not that particular, but can at the same time respect that attention to detail.

“Never wash her stuff.”

Really? I might recommend combining your rules with hers to find the most efficient laundry regime. If I am doing five loads, and she is doing six, that’s 11 loads of laundry per week, not including kids (should you be so lucky). That is madness.

“Firstly, you don’t need a dryer. Just hang things out in the air. It’s much better on the clothes, and on the environment. If it’s not sunny enough outside, buy a clothes rack and hang the clothes in your living room.”

Agreed. I hang dry ALL my clothes religiously. Lost way too many nice garments to heat shrinkage. Oh, coldwater wash on EVERYTHING too.

Hi there, nice article, enjoyed reading it, but
I’m not sure our washing machines are the same here in the UK as they are in the US.
Does ‘Cold’ to you mean the same as to us? For us that means just water from the cold pipe, i.e. about 15 degrees Celsius.
What does ‘Warm’ mean? For us I guess that’d be 30 or 40 degC.
Also, what does short and long cycle mean? We have many many different programs, for instance whether for cottons, synthetics, delicates, wools, and each have a different length of time, and the times even vary between temperatures. What times were you thinking of?

Would you be able to give a more accurate description of what you mean?

Many Thanks!

Rob

Thanks for the prompt reply Joe!
Wow only 7 minutes with cold water? and that gets things clean?? I’m impressed! That’s so far from the warm water temperatures that garment labels suggest and the 100minute normal cycles that washing machines have that I never would’ve thought it!

+1 for a drying rack.

I pay for my dress shirts to get laundered and pressed (usually about $2/shirt). Wool goes to the dry cleaners ($5). But just about everything else goes into one load in the washer at the laundromat. I used to be religious about separating colors (usually meaning 2 or 3 loads) but now it’s just so much cheaper and easier to throw it all in one wash. Down side to that though is that I wear white a whole lot less often.

How do you launder those Express Signature Polos?

“Live with a lady? Lucky you. Don’t wash her stuff. She has a system that’s not yours.”
Good article. But I really wish less people used that cocky, unmistakably living-in-a-basement tone of voice. I hear it so often on the Internet that I’ve christened it: I call it the dick tone. Why don’t people talk like that in real life? Probably because no one would talk to them. Good article though.