Deep in the Laundry Trenches
Caring for my massive sweater collection is a pain in the ass, but it keeps me humble
This weekend, I finally washed two sweaters that had been sitting on my closet floor for a YEAR. Yes, a whole 12 months.
You might be thinking, Jenn, why didn’t you throw those in the washing machine by now, for God’s sake?? Believe me, I would have looooong ago. If only the washing instructions on my sweaters would allow me to do that.
The problem is, both these sweaters are wool, and both have tags that say I should wash them by hand. Wool is a sturdy but finicky material, and I don’t want to take my chances. If the washing temperature is too warm or the machine cycle is too rough, my sweaters could easily shrink or stretch out and I’d have to give them away to a small child or a very lanky adult, respectively.
Some wool CAN be washed in the machine, but it’s not worth the gamble to me. I have an old, simple washing machine that technically belongs to my landlord so I can’t replace it even if I want to. It’s functional, but I don’t trust the machine enough to set it to delicate cycle and hope that it will actually handle my sweaters delicately.
So, my best option is to hand-wash each sweater at least once a year (because wool is pretty stink-resistant). That sounds easy enough, but what if you have more than a dozen sweaters that can’t go in the machine and they’re all different colors? Plus you don’t have a utility sink because you live in an apartment so you have to make due with two small washbasins and a bathtub?
If you’re me, you end up with a pile of sweaters in your closet that you’d rather stumble over for a year than take the time to wash.
Yes, there are practical reasons why I don’t enjoy hand washing that mainly tie back to my less-than-ideal laundry setup. I also have eczema on my hands that makes it difficult/painful/annoying to deal with anything that involves water and soap. I’ve tried wearing gloves but they make my skin super sweaty and don’t offer the same dexterity that I have if I’m just using my bare hands.
So I usually wait until my eczema gets less bad, which is in the spring/summer when the weather isn’t so dry. But because it’s warm outside again, I have no motivation to wash my sweaters because I’m not going to wear them for months. Sweater washing becomes pretty low on my list of perpetual chores come summertime. I have plenty of other things I can hand wash, and most of them aren’t nearly as cumbersome as an oversized wool garment that barely fits in my wash basin.
Surely if I hated washing sweaters so much, you’d think I might cap my collection at just one or two. But no — I have almost 40 different sweaters, sweater vests, and sweater dresses. They’ve come from thrift stores, clothing trades, slow fashion brands, secondhand websites, and as gifts and hand-me-downs. The oldest sweaters I have date back to high school, and the most recent one I bought was a striking, cobalt blue alpaca wool cardigan I came across at a shop in Bend, Oregon during my trip in February. (My carry-on suitcase barely fit in the overhead bin when I was coming back home.)
I love collecting sweaters more than any other type of clothing. This feels appropriate for someone who lives in the Midwest, where winter lasts six to seven months out of the year. But I also realize that my sweater habit is a bit unique (and obsessive) compared to most people I know. No one needs 40 sweaters. And yet here I am, cherishing each one while searching for the next knit worthy of my closet space.
To me, collecting sweaters feels like collecting art. I have a deep respect for the craft of knitting (and fiber arts in general), which makes me appreciate each sweater in my collection even more. This mindset also means I’m willing to spend more on each sweater, which is how I ended up with so many nice ones that require hand washing or dry cleaning.
About 15 of the sweaters in my collection are Hand Wash Only. That’s not a huge number, but it’s significant enough that by the end of each winter, I have to plan out how I’m gonna wash them all before they go in storage.
I made a rule for myself this year: I’m not allowed to wash more than two sweaters per week. The whole ritual of fetching my wash basins and soaking, squeezing, rinsing, drying, laying, and rotating each sweater starts to piss me off if I do it too frequently. It takes at least an hour to wash each sweater, and I can only do two at a time with the tools I have. Plus, I don’t have enough space to dry more than two or three wet sweaters at a given time without tripping on them.
If we do that math, that means it’s going to take about 7.5 weeks to wash all my sweaters, which is almost two months. This is the thing they don’t tell you about having nicer clothes: you often have to put more time and energy into caring for them so that they can last.
I’m not even complaining about it, since I really love the sweater collection I’ve built up over the years. But boy, are there days when I wish someone else could just do the washing for me, even if that someone was just my washing machine.
This whole Olympic-level clothes-washing event helps me remember how tedious and special clothing can be. There’s a broad societal habit of consuming clothing the way we consume fast food: by treating it as disposable, cheap, and replaceable. When you stop and think about how much goes into garment-making — sourcing fabric/materials, designing a well-fitting pattern, hiring a skilled sewist, dyeing the garment, pre-washing and finishing it so that it’s ready to wear — it’s a shock to think we ever decided to view clothing this way.
It’s both a blessing and a curse that I have to spend so many weeks cleaning and drying my woolies (and finicky cottons) every year. Hand washing forces me to slow down and put more care into maintaining each sweater I’ve committed to keeping around.
I’m well aware that not everyone has the time (or the desire) to do this same thing with their clothing, and I’m thankful that most things can go in the washing machine these days. But there’s something to be said about having to put actual effort into caring for things that took a lot of time and care to make in the first place.
On top of all this, maybe one day I’ll get the memo that 15 hand-wash-only sweaters is enough for one person.
This newsletter wouldn’t be possible without all of my readers, including YOU!
If this post brightened your day, taught you something new, or made you think, consider supporting my newsletter financially through a one-off or monthly donation. Any amount means the world!
Writing is my full-time job and your financial support helps me dedicate time every week to write new essays and develop writing classes. Help keep these things going by dropping a few bucks in my tip jar today.
And while you’re at it, give a round of applause for my 2025 supporters:
Dennis T.
Emma H.
KRW
Grandma Gin Gin
Maddie B.
Tara Y.
👏👏👏
An hour? What takes an hour? Those are some mighty clean sweaters. I am glad I don't have so much of that these days. I don't have a utility sink either.