Drying clothes indoors...working out the kinks

[puglogic]

I'd like to dry a lot more of our clothing indoors this winter rather than run the dryer.   We have two drying racks and an empty closet with a pole....and it's super-dry here so things dry within hours.

My problem is definitely of the first-world variety:  I haven't yet found a way for us to hang "nicer" shirts on hangers to dry where it doesn't leave weird spots in the shoulders where the hanger was. For those who dry indoors without an indoor clothesline (which I don't have space for)  how do you make it so you don't have weird shoulders/sleeves and have to iron stuff?  Are there special giant hangers or...?

Thanks. Certainly not earthshattering but I think I could more easily talk my lovely non-MMM husband into it if I could come up with a solution for that  :)

[former player]

Padded hangers?  You can make them to the shape you need with the sort of battening that quilters use (although old tights are more mustachian) and covers made from anything from silk scarves to scraps of remnant material or old clothes that are otherwise on the way to dust rags or recycling.

[stripey]

The less immediately helpful solution is having a hanger with thicker hanging rails, like wooden dowelling or small wooden planks (as in a sheila maid).This will reduce or eliminate the crease from the hanging site.

[MayDay]

I hang H's dress shirts. Once dry, I throw them into the dryer. Every couple weeks I dry all the dress shirts with half a load of wet stuff (usually little stuff like socks that are annoying to hang a million of). The wet stuff sort of steams the wrinkles out.

[Rural]

 if you hang things inside out, often the problems resolve themselves when you wear the clothing for just a few minutes.

[stripey]

Also, whilst I was hanging out my own laundry, I thought it would be worth asking some other questions:

- Are you giving all the shirts a good flick/snap prior to hanging them? (This really does help with wrinkles particularly with items that have high proportions of cotton, linen or silk)
- Are you actually hanging the shirts on a hanger to air-dry them or draping them directly over the drying rail? (The latter takes up more space but is gentler on the clothing as there is less stretch on clothes at the points of a coat hanger- particularly important with knit fabrics)
- If you're hanging the shirts on a hanger, is it wire, wooden, padded? Does the hanger actually fit the clothing item at the shoulders?

[teen persuasion]

I have a motley collection of hangers.  I try to match the hanger shape/size to the items.  So little ones for the kids clothes, big plastic ones for DH's T-shirts, smaller plastic ones for my snugger T-shirts, wire dry cleaning hangers for DH's dress shirts.  Snap the wrinkles out well, and shape the shirt properly on the hanger (line up shoulders, etc.).  Some things I drape over a rack instead, like sweaters - they are too heavy and stretch out of shape on a hanger.

[GuitarStv]

Hanger:


Shirt destruction device:


Use the former, not the latter and you'll be fine.

[Freedomin5]

My MIL taught me to hang the shirt upside down. Clip the bottom edge of the shirt to the bottom of the hanger, the part that gets tucked in. You may have to flick it a bit after it's dry, but that's how I hang sweaters which do tend to make a weird dent in the shoulders. Or if using a fold out-type drying rack, skip the hanger altogether and just drape it in half over the wire.

[Jacana]

For my husband's dress shirts, the biggest factor in how nice it hang dries is the material. His shirts that are perm press wrinkle free come out good. His shirts that are not come out wrinkled in spots like shoulders and back. I hate to iron, so now he mostly has wrinkle free. Same for pants.

We found that using good wooden hangers or really thick plastic hangers without that little inset for straps is necessary with men's dress shirts and polos. It helps if you button the collar and first button while drying. Try to shape the shirt collar to a natural position too (kind of up in the back and tighter around the hanger) as that seems to bring the shoulders in. Then I would snap them a bit or wave them around to get everything to settle. I didn't have much luck drying them upside down, but worth a try.

Nicer sweaters, lay flat or drape over a few bars, don't hang. Nicer women's shirts, depends on the material but I would usually just hang from the line or rack. But I am less picky than he is about wrinkles.

[shadowmoss]

You can get inflatable hangers from Amazon.  Unless you have cats that like to play and puncture them (what happened to a few of mine) they work very well to keep creases out of shoulders of tops as well as helping things to dry quickly since they are 'fat' and hold the sides away from each other and letting in more air.

[Petuniajo]

I dry things until they are almost completely dry, then toss them in the dryer for 5 or 10 minutes to fluff/soften.

[maco]

Regular wooden hangers work fine for us, not even needing to be the very shaped ones like GuitarStv posted (I only have one of those--it's for letting sewing projects hang before doing the hem). They're right that wire ones are a no-no though (or the ones that are advertised like "look, they're so thin you can fit more clothes in your closet!")