The laundry mistake that changed the way I dry my clothes

Line drying clothes outside is truly superior to using a dryer – unless, of course, it’s raining – but there is one thing I’ve learnt the hard way to be careful of.

Mindlessly pegging my coloured T-shirts to the clothes line has become a thing of the past after noticing a drastic change in some of my newer garments.

It’s not the first time I’ve experienced this issue but it previously came on gradually and only became noticeable when the clothes reached, what I would call, ‘older’ status.

READ MORE: Expert reveals ‘right way’ to put cutlery in the dishwasher

But with clear stripes of lighter colour on darker coloured fabric I realised the sun was seriously bleaching my shirts.

This prompted a couple of changes at first; the most simple one is drying things inside out and the second is hanging coloured things at the back of the line where it is shadier.

A complete guide to the meaning of every laundry symbol

Drying clothes inside out doesn’t take much to do, especially if you’re already washing them inside out – an expert approved tip to improve the longevity of clothing.

It takes a bit to get into the habit of doing this but it helps if you toss clothes into the laundry hamper inside out to begin with.

READ MORE: The Kmart buy so popular a mum is taking it home to Italy

As for hanging coloured things at the back of the line, this was a surprisingly harder change because I had a specific order for hanging items. This is based on the fact that it’s easier to get larger things like jeans out of the mahcine first so they ended up at the bottom of the basket with socks and underwear on top.

I have a different basket now that’s shorter but wider so I can still group things with coloured shirts, coloured pants and pyjamas together while still getting the larger items out first.

READ MORE: Woman sparks debate over boyfriend’s laundry detergent habit

These two changes have helped reduce the amount of bleaching visible on most clothes, except two new shirts that have now got a stripe of bleach on the inside back (not the right side thankfully) about the width of the line they were hung over.

So even being in the shadiest part of the line didn’t help because the sun was still shining just on the top of the clothesline.

This has meant I’m now drying my shirts inside on a clothes airier to completely avoid any bleaching because there’s no real shady spot in the backyard where it would fit.

The airer is placed either by the back door with the glass door open for breeze and gentler sunlight, or the middle of the side wall where I can open the front and back doors for a flow through breeze.

READ MORE: Clever hack makes it easy to dry annoying sheet inside

I recently tried this for the first time and dried them by draping over several lines to avoid peg marks and potentially stretching them out of shape.

It means a little extra effort to put clothes on the line and then inside and the annoyance of having the airer out in a small house, but I want my clothes to last as long as possible to make the most of the money I spent on them and to avoid adding to landfill.

For a daily dose of 9honey, subscribe to our newsletter here.

I do still use the shirts that have been bleached by the sun and wear them when I’m doing nothing at home or something messy like cleaning or painting.

And when the shirts become too thin to wear they will make perfect rags for cleaning by cutting them up or using whole.

I still swear by line drying though, I’m just now doing it a little differently.

FOLLOW US ON WHATSAPP HERE: Stay across all the latest in celebrity, lifestyle and opinion via our WhatsApp channel. No comments, no algorithm and nobody can see your private details.