WASHER'S BUT NO DRYER
 

While search many websites for apartments in Paris and Amsterdam for our trip this fall, I find many have washers but no dryers.

I know I will rent an apt with a dryer, I am just curious if anyone knows why they wouldnt offer a dryer?

In places like France and Holland were it doesnt get that warm, how would you get your clothes dry?

In photos it doesnt look like it is set up to hang the laundry out the window to dry :)

In Italy I have dried a pair of jeans in one day without a dryer, but I cant see that happening at the end of Sept. in Holland.

Many French washing machines also double as dryers - perhaps the websites aren't explaining that. And many people simply don't have them. Space is at a premium, much more so than in the USA.

The apartment will have a foldable rack that you hang clothes on. The dryers I've used in Europe aren't like American dryers and take forever anyway. Hanging seems to work just fine even in northern countries.

Last May, we rented an apartment in Paris for the month. There was a washer-dryer (one appliance that did both functions) in the kitchen. I never was able to figure out how to work that dadgum thing! Either the clothes would never dry, or they ended up crunchy-dry and ruined. I would have really appreciated a folding rack so I could hang my clothes to air-dry. I get the impression that Europeans aren't as into dryers as we Americans are. I know my British relatives have washers in their homes, but they insist on hanging up their clothes (indoors, mostly, given the weather) to dry.

I was surprised at that when I visited a friend who lived in Germany. She also had a rack on which to hang clothes. I wondered what she did when she washed sheets.

I find the spin gets things dry enough to hang out on an airing rack - even sheets and duvet covers. But I've got the time and spare clothes to wait for the drying.

Just another reason to do the sensible thing and only bring along easy-wash and quick-dry garments.

The new microfibers resist odor, wick perspiration and seem to last forever. Your travel life will change when a nightly rinse with a bit of shampoo becomes a habit, in a few hours things are dry.

if you only take two of everything, from undies to shirt/blouses to pants, you'll love it, that's really travelling light, and using even a washing machine suddenly seems silly and a waste of time and money.

Look to the smart things they sell at places like
www.duluthtrading.com
www.travelsmith.com
www.exofficio.com

and many others - mix'n-match wardrobes with practical multi-pocket designs that help you look smart and guard against pickpockets - what's not to like?

Some apartments have a towel warmer in the bathroom that does a great job of drying garments overnight.

Its not the same everywhere, that's one of the reasons we travel! They wouldn't offer a dryer because they likely don't have one and don't see the need for one. When we came to France 14 years ago virtually no one had a dryer.

In many European countries there is not enough room for two machines, and a dryer is less useful than a washer. Many people here hang their laundry rather than put it in a machine. Air dries clothes pretty well, and has done so for a long time.

Machines do exist that will wash and dry - not very quickly, but it does offer the possibility of drying clothes.

You do need to remember however that they will normally dry only half a load - most dry by extraction, rather than by venting the air outside. The water goes into a drawer, which must then be emptied. If you're in an apartment or a small house venting to the outside is not always an option.

Also you probably want to set the spin option as high as your clothes will accept. My washer spins up to 1200 turns a minute, which means they come out pretty dry. Hang them up and they're dry quite quickly.

I've just hung up my fourth load of laundry today. I have a downstairs room just for washing and hanging up laundry. A "dehumidifier" sucks out the humidity and dries the clothes hung up on the line.

Much of our clothes are made for hot dryers.

I have a utility room with washer, dryer and drying racks.
If the weather is fine, I dry my washing outside and just put things like towels and underwear in the dryer to fluff them up and get them really dry.
A fast spin gets things iron dry.
I use my dryer far less than I used to.
Our village is trying to be carbon neutral and dryers are very hungry beasts.
Our electricity bills are much smaller since I cut down on its use.

almost all american homes have been wired and equipped for venting dryers for more than 50 years. not so here in europe. we are just discovering this 'luxury'.

for example, here in england, we have 'airing cupboards'....useless cupboards that are meant to dry clothing on shelves. these should be called 'moulding cupboards' instead. locking wet clothing into a small cupboad only makes mould and does not dry anything. but we are thick and have not yet figured this out. these idiotic and archaic cupboards are commonly in houses that are quite new, believe it or not.

and the romantic notions about air drying clothing are silly. we have serious moisture problems...our country is very damp. it rains nearly every day and outside is not an option. inside we already have too much damp.

aparatuses that try to wash AND dry are competely useless.

we are living in the stone age. pity us.

Either the washing machine will be a washer dryer or there will be a rack to hang clothes on.

I have a washer and a separate dryer. The dryer only gets used when I have to get things dry in a hurry. Usually I hang my washing outside, even in winter. If it is raining I don't wash. If we run out then I will do a wash and put it in the dryer.
When the kids were home it was a different matter, but even then when I could hang washing out I did. My washing machine spins at a high rate (1400rpm) which gets things pretty dry anyway - shirts and the like can be ironed and just hung to finish off.
The only thing that always goes in the tumble dryer, for a very short time are towels, just to fluff them up.

My mother didn't even have a washing machine, just a copper boiler, but managed to produce clean dry ironed shirts for my four brothers and my father every day. The weather was no better then I can can assure you, and the clothes were hung up literally dripping wet. Sometimes the shirts would come in frozen stiff as boards, but she coped. She was so thrilled to get a "twin-tub" eventually, and only a couple of years before she died finally a modern front loading machine. She never owned a dryer.
We are spoiled nowadays.

There is a clothes line on my balcony where I put up everything in summer and the big pieces in winter. Washing is done when the weather allows. Sweaters and shirts are dried on hangers indoors in winter, smaller pieces on a rack, the socks on the central heating.
I have never owned a dryer and don't want one. I consider dryers an unnecessary waste of money and energy.

You'd have to be very thick to put <i>wet</i> clothes into an airing cupboard. That's not what it's there for.

And as for walkinaround's idea that air-drying clothes is a &quot;romantic&quot; notion - well, really, what else did our foremothers do for centuries?

I completely understand the space issue, but I honestly don't get the &quot;we are spoiled&quot; thing. I don't know about you, but I have way better things to do with my limited free time than hang and iron laundry! Do those of you who think driers are unnecessary only communicate in person (not using telephones or, heaven forbid, computers)? Do you walk everywhere, or ride your horse? Progress!

sf3707 - that kind of progress is wasteful, and why would you want to iron travel clothing when the right kind dries just fine and looks OK? Ten minutes at the most before you go to bed for a quick handwash, and by doing it you waste no electricity, cause no noise (running appliances late is frowned upon in many European buildings), create no heat that needs to be vented... Now that's progress!

Ever heard of saving energy, pollution, global warming, etc.? Thinking of that is what I call progress.

We've mastered the art of turning rental accommodation into a Chinese laundry with washed clothes draped over every chair etc, including the heated towel rails. By the time we return at the end of the day the clothes are dry and can be tidied away in a few minutes.

Other posters are correct that you will probably find the washer is also a dryer. Not my favourite appliance I must admit.

Just as an aside, it's still very common here in Australia to use a clothes line in the back garden to dry the washing, which is a very ecologically sound practice. It's so hot here at the moment that lighter items are dry in about 1/2 hour!!

&quot;Do those of you who think driers are unnecessary only communicate in person (not using telephones or, heaven forbid, computers)? Do you walk everywhere, or ride your horse? Progress!&quot;

What's a computer?

Schuler, you live there, you should know: It's a Swiss Army Knife (must be Victorinox, of course) with a keyboard and mouse attached.

Hi Dalai: I actually own a Swiss Army knife with a pullout UBS stick. Now that's progress!

That should be USB stick.
Here's a picture: http://www.victorinox.com/index.cfm?page=157&amp;lang=D

Yeah, if it was UBS it wouldn't be worth much... I tried to tell a TSA guy that this was a computer peripheral, like a mouse, not a knife, and he didn't believe me.

Just to bring it back to the topic, no, it doesn't dry your clothes...

<i>that kind of progress is wasteful</i>

No disagreement there. But so is much of our so-called &quot;progress&quot;, which is why I asked the question, whether the people who hang out their clothes to dry also eschew other forms of 21st-century &quot;progress&quot;.

Also, I wasn't at all referring to travel clothes that dry quickly - I think that's a great idea.

Well, I know I made the comment about a washing line being kinder to the environment, but to be completely honest, the main motivation is $. It annoys me to pay for such a lot of electricity, when I live in a warm, sunny climate.

I wonder how much more expensive my electricity bills would be if I dried everything in the dryer - I don't want to think about it!!

Thank you all for your interesting replies.

I guess I am innocent to the facts that alot of the world doesnt have or use clother dryers.

Hard to imagine clothes draped all over the house or molding in a closet.

I dont consider having a dryer a luxury. I am glad I am spoiled.

Hello Everyone,
I for one hang our clothes on drying racks because propane is very expensive where I live. I save a minimum of $200 a month by doing this. Times this times 12 months a year times 15 years and that's a whopping $36,000 I've saved. What is she doing with that money she saved you ask! Well...going to Europe for three months this summer.

So...to sum it up...I dry my clothes on racks in order to go to Europe! Yippeee. It's as simple as that.

Take care,
Michele

Or why not to bring jeans on a trip to Europe.

Why not Jeans in Europe? Only because they take so long to dry I would've thought.

we're warped. now we are lecturing the americans about use of dryers.

well here in the uk we heat the cold outdoors so that we can smoke outside at pubs during the winter. that, to me, seems much less environmental than the careful use of a clothes dryer, which at least serves a useful purpose.

which brings me to my main point...the CAREFUL use of a dryer. it's not an all or nothing thing. the fact is that it is very damp in many countries of europe and drying towels or thick clothing is very difficult. SOMETIMES it's possible to dry things by air and other times it is a big problem.

all this talk about space is also a little funny. an erected drying rack in home nearly 100% of the time (for example, if you have children and need to do a lot of laundry) takes a lot more space than a dryer which can be stacked on top of a washer (only 60cm wide). nothing makes a small flat or small house feel smaller than wet clothing strewn all over.

obviously our forefathers and mothers survived without dryers...that is not an argument that we shouldn't have them today. the fact is that we live in the dark ages. here in the UK, MANY people lack dryers and central heat. using archaic devices like 'storage heaters' and strewing clothing all over an improperly heated home is a recipe for mould and stank....we are decades behind the modern world. jesus help us.

You put the clothes on a fold-up clothes drying rack.

I couldn't live without my dryer. I am happily a spoiled american! I was in Austria last summer and spent some time at the relatives and of them had two washers, but no dryer. She hung out and ironed all their clothes. She also washed and ironed our clothes for us, she works full time and has two small kids!
I have two teens who play sports and my dryer runs all year long! I can't imagine drying towels by hanging out. They would be so stiff!

walkingaround, I think it's high time you applied for citizenship in another country, since you are so consistently dissatisfied with your own. Just get out, asap.

girlonthego,

I agree that alot of time and energy is wasted by those who dont have a dryer.

I bet they dont sell alot of dryer sheets in Europe.

Why not use a laundry-matt or drop off service instead?

oops,

by energy I mean people working, not electric or propane...

suze,

I hauled my laundry to a laundry mat in Florence and swore never to do that again.

I grew up in Europe .
I remember clothes drying forever ( in bad weather) on the balcony. There was no place in the apt. to hang bed sheets , towels etc for the whole family. My poor mother ironed everything for hours to dry it a bit more.

Now ,on our visits to Europe we stay in apartments - there is never a dryer, but for a short trip it does not matter.
I am sure glad I have one where we live ( it was -20C last night)

Do you mind saying what was so awful about using a laundry in Florence? Just curious.