Today I show you how to take care of one of the most important things of the summer:the BEACH TOWEL.
Synonymous with idleness and holidays, towels are nonetheless put to the test.
Sand, sunscreen, chlorinated or salty water... so many reasons that make your towel rough and unpleasant.
Over time, it becomes less and less silky and difficult to clean.
But don't worry, I have a few tricks up my sleeve to keep it silky smooth all summer long.
The proof, my bath towels are at least 5 years old and I have never bought new ones.
Discover11 tips for washing, cleaning and keeping your towel soft longer. Watch:
How often should a towel be cleaned?
- the frequency of washing a beach towel is at least once a week.
But be careful, cleaning is not done anyhow!
There are simple but important washing rules to follow:
- Already, beach towels cannot be washed with other linens such as clothes and sheets .
- Next, don't use as much detergent and softener as usual, because a bath towel is delicate.
Use half the product in the detergent drawer for example.
Regarding the fabric softener, I really advise you not to use a lot, if at all.
Certainly, this product makes the towels softer; but it also makes them less absorbent in the long term!
And a less absorbent towel is much less practical for wiping...
- Choose the right washing temperature.
For white towels, the ideal washing temperature is around 60°C.
For colored towels, wash them at 40°C.
- Finally, make sure to disinfect the towels every 2 or 3 washes.
To do this, pour 15 cl of white vinegar into the dedicated container.
When you're on vacation, you don't necessarily have a washing machine available.
So I show you how to do without them and still clean your beach towels:
- First, take a larger or smaller basin depending on the number of towels to be washed. The more napkins, the larger the container should be.
- Once the right size has been found, clean the container well before putting the towels in it.
- Then add cold or lukewarm water to 3/4 of its capacity with a tiny bit of detergent.
- Put the towels in the basin and let the linen soak in the water for 40 min to 1 hour.
- This is when you have to stir and knead your towels in all directions. If you have a beater, now is the time to use it; it makes it easier.
- Once the towels have been washed, wring them well, twisting them in all directions to drain all the water.
- Then soak the towels in clean water for 5 min.
- Repeat the washing operation until the towel is clean.
- Squeeze well before drying.
Drying your towels is an important step.
It should not be done lightly, otherwise it will take too long to dry.
Watch how to optimize this step:
- For the towels to dry well, lay them out on a good drying rack in a ventilated and warm place.
- Another important thing:stretch them out avoiding creases and dry them right after washing. That way, mold doesn't have time to set in and you avoid odors.
- If you have a dryer, be careful to set the drying time according to the material of the towel.
- Finally, wait until the towels are perfectly dry before folding and storing them.
More and more towels are now made of microfiber material like the Nabaiji from Decathlon.
So let's look together at how to perfectly clean this type of towels:
- In hot water, add washing-up liquid or liquid detergent.
The proportions to be respected are as follows:for 10 liters of water, count 10 ml of cleaning product.
- Gently dip your towels in it and let sit.
- Start washing them gently with your hands until the stains disappear.
- Once clean, rinse the microfiber towels with hot water to remove the cleaning substances.
- All you have to do is wring them out and stretch them out as we saw above, without making any creases.
The microfiber towels are machine washable.
However, some precautions should be observed:
- Always wash microfiber towels together.
Indeed, other materials could fluff during washing and make the microfiber less effective.
- Use only mild liquid detergents and especially no fabric softener or bleach.
Why ? Because powder detergent gets stuck in the fibers and too strong detergents damage the microfibre.
As for fabric softener and bleach, they significantly deteriorate the microfiber.
- Finally, choose a wash in cold water or maximum at 30°C because the microfiber does not support high heat!
- Drying microfiber towels in the open air is preferable.
As said above, this material is quite sensitive to extreme heat.
Drying in the open air prevents them from being attacked, which prolongs their life.
- If you have no choice but to put them in the dryer, do it on a low and gentle temperature.
By doing so, you preserve the material and keep your towels longer.
We just saw how to go about washing and drying microfiber and cotton towels.
Now let's look at what more natural products like vinegar, baking soda, aloe vera and others provide.
There are plenty of good reasons to wash clothes with white vinegar.
And beach towels are no exception.
For example, adding white vinegar to the wash cycle helps fix the colors.
No more drooling towels during the first washes; thanks to the vinegar, the colors remain vivid for a long time.
Another advantage:
Using machine-washed white vinegar keeps your beach towel soft.
As said before, vinegar easily replaces classic fabric softeners.
Thanks to him, the towel retains its absorbency as on the first day.
In addition, white vinegar disinfects and eliminates bad odors from fabric fibres.
No more musty or musty smells when laundry comes out of the machine.
Ah yes last thing; vinegar is hard on limescale.
It cleans your machine from the inside, so your laundry doesn't come out hard.
You see, there are only advantages to using this miracle product.
So to find softer towels, simply pour 2 tablespoons of white vinegar into the softener tray.
Your towels become rough after only 2 washes?
This is surely due to very hard water if you live in limestone regions for example.
If this is your case, a super ally allows you to no longer find your towels last like a stone.
I named the excellent baking soda.
Add 1 to 2 tablespoons of baking soda to your tray before starting the machine.
Add the dose of detergent as usual and you're done.
Not only do your towels become supple again, but the baking soda also deodorizes and revives the white!
Aloe vera is a natural plant with multiple benefits that is used for many things.
It is mainly known for its moisturizing and soothing properties.
This makes aloe vera a great fabric softener for towels.
The instructions couldn't be simpler.
In a basin of water, soak the towels with aloe vera for 2 hours.
It takes a spoonful of aloe vera gel for 1 liter of water.
Thanks to this grandmother method, your towels are soft and ultra absorbent.
Another homemade product that makes towels perfectly clean and fluffy:glycerin.
Take a container and pour in 5 tablespoons of glycerin and 30 drops of essential oil of your choice.
Add mineral water or distilled water and mix well.
You've just created a homemade fabric softener to make your towels super fluffy.
Pour this composition into the fabric softener compartment of the machine and you will see the difference!
Other grandmother's recipes based on glycerin are also possible.
For example, you can also do this composition:
- Boil 20 g of rice starch for a few seconds in hot water.
- Stir while it boils and add at least 1.5 liters of water in addition.
- Then pour 0.5 liters of white vinegar, 10 g of Glycerins and even an essential oil of your choice.
- Stir everything; your solution is ready to use. Just put 1-3 tablespoons in the machine tray.
Sunscreen obviously gets all over our towels all the time.
Either because you drop it, or simply because you lie on the towel.
Very oily, this sunscreen can make quite ugly spots.
To get rid of them effectively, do this:
Put liquid detergent on the stain as soon as possible and leave for 30 minutes before washing.
By applying this little trick, you no longer have any visible stains.
After reading our grandmother's recipes, do you think you know everything?
Well no; I have 3 more tips for you:
Have you just bought a nice beach towel and are you ready to take it with you to the fine sand?
I advise you not to do this right away.
Soak it first in a container of cold water, without adding detergent, for at least 12 hours.
Why do this?
Quite simply because a new towel is covered with a lot of not very healthy product.
Soaking it removes all these residues.
Attention, I insist on an important point.
I did say to soak it without detergent in a container of water.
No question of putting your new towel in the washing machine before applying this trick.
This would have the effect of fixing the residues and no longer making it absorbent.
A beach towel, we necessarily put it on the ground on the sand.
This sand becomes embedded in the fibers and makes the towel rough.
It is therefore important to shake it regularly to remove the grains.
When I say regularly, it's not necessarily every 5 min.
But a good shake once in a while is important.
It is also ideal not to land on the towel immediately once you have dried yourself with it.
Let it dry in the sun before.
As with most things, choosing a quality product gives you peace of mind over time.
For beach towels it is the same.
It may be a little more expensive to buy, but the towel pays you well in time.
The quality of the fabric does not deteriorate and your towel retains its softness much longer.
Look at hotel towels; they are washed a lot, but they still keep their softness!
So do not hesitate to take quality.
Me for example, I bought these 4 years ago and they haven't moved.
