Living in Europe, I have long since passed up the comforts of pulling a warm shirt straight from the dryer over my head. Instead, for the last six years, my washing machine has been one of those Energystar-compliant combination washers and dryers. It works well enough, spinning clothes to a tolerable level of dampness after every wash, and usually a couple of hours on the clothes horse is all that’s needed to get everything dry.
But heavy wools and sweater materials are always irksome, maintaining a secret reserve of ice cold moisture that does not exhibit itself until pulled onto a goosebumped torso. I could use one of these Sweater Dryers, then, which sets itself up under a drying rack and uses eight vents to accelerate the drying process. It’s $29.98, and it might save me a few of the unsightly radiator scorch marks that have graced most of my sweaters for the last few years.
Sweater Dryer with Fan [Taylor Gifts via Random Good Stuff]
This looks like one of those stupid gadgets that are sold in the back of sunday newspaper magazines and cheezy catalogs.
Of course, you are aware that if you have that rack thing, the sweater will dry by itself in about a day.
[quote]Living in Europe, I have long since passed up the comforts of pulling a warm shirt straight from the dryer over my head.[/quote]
?
I am living in Europe and currently enjoy the comfort of pulling a warm shirt straight from the dryer over my head.
Gadget looks as though it would work, but be pointless. Who hangs clothes horizontally anyway?
@2 Sweaters shouldn’t really be hung vertically, especially when wet. It stretches them out.
My apartment doesn’t have space. Most people just have the combo ones.
No, not most people. At least not if you still include scandinavia in Europe. Maybe in your corner of this place, but most of my friends have both a washer, and a full size drier. Either in the house, apartment or in the basement.
@3: yes, it stretches, which compensates wonderfully for the shrinking that took place earlier in the washing process.
@5 I don’t have a dryer at all. And I think John was referring to energy consumption, what with energy prices rising astronomically the past two years in Germany.
Six C-size cells? Gah!
@6 it depends on the fabric it’s made from. Some sweaters won’t shrink up with the washing process. Not to mention if it’s washed in cold. Most sweaters should not be hung vertically when trying because the weight pulls it down and stretches it.
I lived in England for a while and still go over often. I lived without a dryer for ages and I used the radiator a lot to get nice warm clothes. But in the summer that was out. So just a regular hair dryer was fine and didn’t take up so much space.
I just used one of these and pointed my room fan at it: http://www.organize-it-online.com/itm_chrdryra.html
My acrylic and micro-fleece stuff is almost dry, straight out of the spin cycle. Even my woolens were fine after just a few hours of the fan pointed at them.
(I hear that the wooden ones are chintzy and should be avoided.)
Fuchsia sweaters don’t quite explain your rage.. ;D