Laundryheap Blog – Laundry & Dry Cleaning

Same-day collection. Free delivery in 24 hours.

Tag Archives: laundry routine


by Leave a comment

How to sort your laundry

Half of the battle of doing laundry is sorting through your dirty washing and deciding what to put in each load. These tips on how to sort your laundry will make that process easier.

  • Partitioned laundry basket
  • A basket per room
  • Separate pre-treated clothing 
  • Clothing colour
  • Fabric type
  • Level of dirtiness 
  • Use Laundryheap

Partitioned laundry basket 

A partitioned laundry basket is a great way to begin sorting your clothes. They usually come in sections of two or three. This means that you can have a partition for your colours and darks if you have two partitions, or colours, blacks, and whites, if you have three partitions. If you stick to only putting the correct colour in each section of your laundry basket, when it comes to laundry day, it will be as simple as unloading one partition at a time. 

A basket per room 

Alternatively, to the partitioned laundry basket, you could assign a washing basket per room in your home. This means that you can do a load of washing per room at any given time. You will find that by using this method you will begin washing similar items and fabrics together. For example, a laundry basket in the bathroom will be filled with towels of the same or similar fabrics. This saves time sifting through your clothes to find similar fabrics that can be washed on the same setting. 

Separate pre-treated clothing

When you stain your clothing it’s always best to treat the stain immediately. After you’ve pre-treated your stain, if you don’t want to wash the item of clothing straight away, separate it from the rest of your washing and put your pre-treated items in the same pile. This will help you with your laundry firstly because your stained items should be washed as a priority, but secondly, because your stained items may have been pre-treated with chemicals that could damage your non-stained clothing. 

Clothing colour

Regardless of whether you use a laundry basket, or simply create a laundry heap, it’s always a good idea to sort your clothing by colour. Create a coloured, dark, and white, pile, perhaps even separating your coloured pile into darker and lighter colours. It’s important to wash similar coloured clothing together to avoid colour run stains. By creating separate coloured piles of laundry, pre-laundry day, you save yourself the task of sifting through a basket of dirty laundry to find similar colours to wash together. 

Fabric type

As important as it is to wash similar colours of clothing together, it is also important to wash similar fabric types together. When your clothing goes into the washing machine, the items rub against one another as the washing machine spins. If you wash a rougher fabric, such as denim, with a delicate fabric, such as silk, this rubbing together creates friction that can cause fibres to break, leading to the delicate fabric to tear. To avoid this, make sure that you wash similar materials together. This will also help you decide what setting to wash your items on as some materials are best washed on hotter or colder washes. 

Level of dirtiness 

If you have clothing that is very dirty, a muddy sports kit, for example, it’s best to separate this clothing from the rest of your washing. Incredibly dirty clothing may have to be washed more than once in order to fully remove the dirt. If you wash your dirty clothing with less soiled clothing, you risk dirtying your normal laundry further. It’s best to sort your heavily soiled laundry separately, washing it as a priority, then cleaning your washing machine out before doing your usual laundry load. This will prevent any cross-contamination of dirt and ensure that all of your laundry is effectively cleaned.  

Image by Osamu Iwasaki

Use Laundryheap

If you haven’t found the right sorting method for you, let us take the load off and sort your laundry for you. You can book your Laundryheap dry cleaning slot by heading to the Laundryheap website or by downloading the free Laundryheap app. 


by 3 Comments

How to manage your laundry

Image by Aqua Mechanical

If not managed properly, laundry can be a daunting task to take on. That being said, with these 10 useful tips your laundry can become simple, efficient, and a lot easier to manage. 

  • Choose a laundry day
  • Make sure you aren’t over-washing your clothes
  • Use two hampers
  • Buy an immediate laundry hamper
  • Invest in a lingerie bag
  • Treat stains straight away
  • Use an effective system
  • Do something productive whilst waiting 
  • Fold your clothes straight away
  • Use Laundryheap 

Choose a laundry day 

To begin managing your laundry its best to choose a specific day to do your laundry on. Firstly, this will give you a time scale of when you need all of your dirty laundry sorted by. Secondly, if you assign a specific day to the task then you know what will be going on that day and therefore have no excuses for not doing your laundry. 

Make sure you aren’t over-washing your clothes

Before you put an item of clothing in your laundry hamper think about whether it actually needs to be washed. Items such as jeans, for example, don’t need to be washed frequently, and therefore should not be constantly in your laundry hamper. If your clothing is not stained and doesn’t smell bad consider why you are putting it in your laundry hamper and if there is an alternative way to clean the item. For example, if it’s covered in pet hair, use a lint roller to remove it. This method could cut down the amount of laundry that you need to wash and therefore the amount of time you will have to spend doing your laundry. 

Image by Aqua Mechanical

Use two hampers

One of the most time-consuming parts of doing laundry is separating your clothes into whites and colours. Save yourself from having to sift through a mountain of dirty laundry, and invest in two laundry hampers- one for white laundry and the other for coloured laundry. This will save you an abundance of time and make your laundry day as easy as possible. 

Image by Marco Verch

Buy an immediate laundry hamper 

If you want to make your laundry day even easier, invest in an immediate laundry hamper. This hamper is where you deposit all of the laundry that needs to be done ASAP- things such as underwear and stained clothing. Your immediate laundry hamper will let you know what clothing needs to be prioritised when it comes to washing and will save you from running out of essential clothing. 

Invest in a lingerie bag

Lingerie bags are commonly brought so that delicate underwear, such as those made from lace, are not damaged when washed. That being said, lingerie bags are also handy when washing socks. Put your socks inside the bag and put them in the washing machine with the rest of your clothes. The bag will prevent the machine from eating your socks and, if you’re doing a wash with other people, prevent you from being left with mismatched socks. 

 Treat stains straight away

For the best chance of removing stains, you need to treat them as soon as possible. Rather than putting your stained clothing in your laundry hamper and leaving it until laundry day, it’s best to treat the item as soon as you find it. This will not only give you the best chance of eliminating the stain but will also save you an abundance of time when it comes to doing your laundry. 

Use an effective system 

It’s useful to remember that not all clothing is effectively washed in the same way. Always read the care label of your clothing to deduce what will sustain your clothing for the longest. For example, it is always best to hand wash woollen jumpers and leave them flat on a towel to dry. Using the most effective cleaning method may slow down your laundry process, but it will ensure that your clothes stay looking new for longer. 

Do something productive whilst waiting

Washing cycles can take some time to finish, so do something productive whilst you are waiting. Hand wash some of your more delicate items of clothing, clean your house, catch up on some work, whatever it is that needs to be done utilise the time you have waiting for your laundry to be completed and get it done. That way, once you’ve completed your laundry you can completely relax for the rest of the day. 

Fold your clothes straight away 

Whichever way you decide to dry your clothes, it is very easy to leave them to sort and fold for another day. This should not be done. As soon as your clothes are dry you should fold them and put them in their rightful place. Not only will this avoid your clothes from wrinkling, therefore decreasing the time you will have to spend ironing, but it will also get the task out of the way. 

Use Laundryheap

If your laundry is piling up, then let us take the load off. Book your dry cleaning slot with us by heading to the Laundryheap website or by downloading the free Laundryheap app. 

laundry routine


by 2 Comments

Laundry Routines Around The World

Laundry is a household chore that most of us complain about without even realising how easy we have it. We’re fortunate enough to have washing machines and tumble dryers (for some), as a resource to help us do our laundry.

Individuals from western countries within Europe and North America, are very well accustomed to using a domestic washing machine for their laundry routine, even some countries in the Middle East and parts of Asia too.

However, many regions and countries in the world still use the original laundry method of washing by hand, in a river! Simply because of the countries economic inability to have a proper source of water supply to their homes, let alone technology.

Let’s take a look at how some laundry routines and styles are done around the world, starting with the more economically developed going down to the less economically developed:

China

China uses laundry machines, but the top loader ones. One very particular laundry rule in their routine is they NEVER wash socks and underwear together and if you were to take your underwear to get washed in a laundromat, be ready for rejection. Also, they prefer washing underwear by hand to prevent ‘contamination’ from other garments. They’re all about good hygiene there, which is a good thing!

Embed from Getty Images

Though they use washing machines, they don’t have tumble dryers, especially because places in China are too compact. They stick with the traditional air drying method.

Philippines

Most Filipinos in the provinces are accustomed to the traditional hand washing at home method. Routine includes filing water in a big basin from any filtered water source and scrubbing clothes by hand. Drying is done by your typical air dry method, hanging on a clothes line.

Embed from Getty Images

Top loader washing machines are available for purchase in the Philippines but for some, it is unaffordable. 

One thing you’ll find is that laundry detergents are popularly sold in sachets, as a cheaper option to buying a bottled one.

Mumbai, India

If you haven’t heard already, Dhobi Ghat in Mumbai is the ‘worlds largest laundry’ with around 800 wash stations where local workers hand wash clothes for schools, hotels, hospitals and any one needing their laundry done.

The method to hand washing here is, clothes are dunked in water and then beaten against a rock surface (to loosen up soil), scrubbed and hung up to naturally air dry.

Embed from Getty Images

Guatemala, South America

Many parts of Guatemala wash the ancient way…  scrubbing by hand with a rock, in a lake or river. Some communities have to walk a distance to their nearest river/lake in order for them to do laundry. After washing, they pack their wet clothes, bundled in a blanket or in a basket and carry it back home where they can hang it to dry.

Embed from Getty Images

Now, with recent water projects, wash stations have been put into place in areas such as Antigua, where filtered river water will fill up standing open wash basins for locales to do their laundry in.

Niger, Africa

Like in most less economically developed counties, when it’s laundry day in Niger, some locales gather to hand wash their laundry in the Niger river, and once done, leave the garments to dry on the ground. Families take this opportunity to have conversations and a good time. Locales use the river to wash anything, even themselves.

Embed from Getty Images

There are still many regions around the world, even more places in Asia, Africa and South America, where hand washing is their laundry routine and sometimes in a dirty, polluted river.

So, the next time you complain about laundry day, just remember, at least a machine does it for you.

laundry


by 6 Comments

5 Tips To Stay On Top Of Your Laundry

Stay on top of your Laundry game all year round with these 5 great laundry routine tips PLUS a printable laundry schedule template.

Who doesn’t want an easier laundry life? Let’s face it, that laundry pile will never have an ending to it. So what do you do? Just face it, head on and try to enjoy it!

5 Tips To Stay On Top Of Your Laundry

  1. Stock up on Laundry essentials: Avoid the stress of realising last minute that you don’t have enough laundry detergent, fabric softener and whatever else you use in your laundry routine. Who likes an emergency trip to the store just to pick up laundry detergent (and things you don’t need)? To make it easier for yourself, before going out for your regular grocery shopping, check to see if your laundry essentials stock is still full. Also, buy in bulk if and when you can.
  2. Be organised: Being well organised in anything will ALWAYS make your life easier because it saves you the hassle from getting yourself together last minute. Pre-organise laundry loads by dividing them on the go, by colour or fabric type, using a divided hamper bin. Also, don’t forget to pre-treat stains before the hour of laundry arrives. Oh and being organised means folding, hanging and ironing straight after the clothes are dry. Gotta get yourself ready for the next laundry load you know!
  3. Machine care: You have to maintain and clean your washing machine if you want your machine to last long and continue giving clean results. Dirty, and built up washing machines will definitely show (and smell) on your clothes! Give your washing machine an occasional clean to prevent machine damage and stinky clothes!
  4. Get a helping hand: It’s okay to get extra help when doing the laundry, it makes things faster and saves so much time. Get your spouse, children or friends to help you out. If that doesn’t work, remember, we at Laundryheap provide laundry, dry-cleaning, wash and fold, and ironing services.
  5. Stick with a schedule If you have a daily routine, then make a schedule! Schedules help you to stay consistent and keep you on top of things. The key is having a schedule that you can work well with, even if there are unexpected changes.

Think about:

  • How many loads you do per day
  • Which are your lazy and laundry days
  • What type of loads need to be washed on certain days e.g. school uniform
  • Whether you need to iron, hang &/or fold the clothes in the load

We’ve created a printable laundry schedule for you which you can download here. Use when you’re doing the laundry or when Laundryheap is doing it for you.

Feel free to tick, colour or cross the ones that apply to you for that specific day and take down a few notes for yourself or make a few pointers you need to remember.

laundry schedule to stay on top of your laundry