If you've been abroad for any extended amount of time, there is going to be an inevitable situation where you need to do laundry. And where you might need to dry clothes the old-fashioned way, on a clothesline, outside.
Fortunately, it's a fairly easy solution-and I know what you're thinking, oh my god, Erica wrote a whole article on this, but roll around in some scratchy shirts, and you might stop judging 😅-and the simple answer is to simply to dry the clothes inside.
The main compromise is that a piece of clothing dries in six hours instead of one, but hey, that means some planning.
For most of the Western world, a dryer is a first-world convenience. In other parts of the world, it is not standard.
(I also get it! Depending on how dry it is outside, it is the most sustainable, efficient and cheapest method of drying, especially in places like Mexico and Australia. It also doesn't take long, one or two hours, max!)
On a month-long trip to Mexico City, I did notice, however, that this particular method of clothes was turning certain pieces of clothes especially crunchy. This was particularly noticeable in the clothes that had the most cotton.
At first, I thought, it was a hard water problem. Besides turning to fabric softener and vinegar, there is another, cheaper more efficient solution.
Drying clothes inside will reduce the crunchiness factor
It turns out, air drying sun outsides is simply too strong! It's like drying on the hottest cycle.
Long, slow, and inside, it turns out, was the key.
Drying clothes inside is also not an extraordinary inconvenience if you do laundry in the morning.
Though it took a little bit longer, like five hours longer, my clothes retained more of their pillowy softness I yearned to have on my skin, and definitely felt better at the end of the day (though some Reddit folks claim once you go crunchy, you can't go back!).
That's because a traditional dryer and its tumble cycle often loosens the fabric fibers, so another option would be to "slap" the clothes around as bringing them inside the house.
For the record, once I got back to the United States, and did my clothes the "old-fashioned" way, the clothes seemed to go back to their normal softness.
Don't worry, your shirt is fine!
