The growing number of people who choose not to wash their clothes

Ryan Szabo and his team spend hours poring over photos of well-worn jeans, some of them faded, torn, or patched.

The best in the community get praise: “The crotch patch is amazing!”, or “Subtle, even tones…a near perfect balance of wear patterns with stunning blue tones.” The latter is the winner.

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This is how it is judged in the competition Indigo Invitationalwhere people from all over the world wear their jeans under certain rules for a whole year.

To get the best jeans in the world in this peculiar contest there is a fundamental strategy: “low-wash denim”.

Since denim becomes softer with soap and water, one of the keys to achieving high-contrast patterns is don’t wash pants.

Everyone follows this strategy, from members of an anti-laundry people’s club to the CEO of Levi’s.

The low-wash culture

For many, jeans acquire personality as they wear out. (GETTY IMAGES).

For Szabo, the “low-wash” habit began with the purchase of his first pair of jeans in 2010.

used them for six months without washing themon a trip to Europe from his native Canada to Europe.

“It was weird for me to have those stinky jeans,” he told BBC Culture. “They smelled awful.”

In Budapest he met his future wife and the jeans took on their own role in the relationship. “They were stacked on the floor at the foot of the bed,” he recalls.

“You’d walk into the room and you could smell them. Luckily my wife had a huge crush on me.”

Among the competitors at the Indigo Invitational, whose fifth year now begins, more than 9 in 10 delay the first wash of their pants until they have used them 150 or 200 timesestimates Szabo.

Instead of resorting to the washing machine, those who wear unwashed denim learn other ways to care for their garments, such as exposing them to ultraviolet rays (“I call it sunbathing,” says Szabo) or simply airing them out at night.

Szabo himself also admits to sometimes using the washing machine: “As soon as my wife can smell my jeans, she tells me and they immediately go to wash.”

People who wear jeans aren’t the only ones who limit their laundry.

In 2019, the designer Stella McCartney He made headlines by detailing his “low wash” clothing habits and told The Guardian: “The general rule of thumb in life is if you don’t have to clean anything at all, don’t clean.”

“I wouldn’t change my bra every day, and I don’t throw things in the washing machine just because I’ve worn them. I’m very hygienic, but I’m not a fan of dry cleaning or any cleaning for that matter.”

Stella McCartney confessed that she hardly does laundry.

One hundred days of use without washing

Others rethink their laundry habits out of consideration for the environment or due to an increase in the electricity bill.

Mac Bishop, founder of clothing company Wool & Prince, explains that he shifted his focus to “comfort and minimalism” – which resonated well with male consumers and particularly those who hated doing laundry – when he began promoting his women’s brand. Wool&.

Subjected to centuries of sexist advertising for laundry products, women would be less responsive to the idea of ​​not doing laundry, she theorized.

And the research backed that up by showing that, for them, environmentalism was a more effective motivator.

The Wool& brand sells merino wool dresses today with the promotion of the “challenge” of wear the same daily for 100 days.

One payoff from this challenge is “the reduction in laundry that comes with wearing merino on a daily basis,” according to Rebecca Eby of Wool&.

The American Chelsea Harry, a client of the brand, assures BBC Culture that she grew up “in a house where everything was washed after use”, even towels and pajamas.

One summer Harry lived with his grandmother, who taught him to put his pajamas under his pillow in the morning and wear them again at night. He later met her husband, who “almost never does laundry.” And then during the pandemic, he started hiking. That’s when things really changed.

“Obviously, you can’t shower after walking all day if you’re sleeping in a hammock or in a tent,” he says.

In the hiking community some people recommended woolen underwear from a particular brand, which can be worn the following days or washed and dried quickly.

Wearing this and other woolen clothing, Harry found that he could hike for days and still feel comfortable.

“Then I started thinking: Why don’t I do this in my daily life?” she recalls. And so he did.

The smell

She doesn’t care about the smell. “I trust my nose,” she asserts.

In a new dress made from a different wool blend she can smell herself, something that never happens with her other clothes, she explains, even when traveling to hot places like the Middle East.

Like Szabo, use tricks to avoid a complete wash, such as airing the garment overnight or drizzle vinegar or vodka in the armpits.

“I love, at the end of the day, hanging up my wool dress, my wool leggings, my wool socks,” she confesses. “I hang them by the window, shower, put my underwear away and in the morning I put it all back“.

“One of the worst things you can do to a garment, if you want it to last, is wash it.” So says Mark Sumner, professor of sustainable fashion at the University of Leeds.

washing machines and sustainability

The washing machine has become an essential utensil, even for those who do little laundry. (GETTY IMAGES).

With one wash, he says, clothes can tear, shrink, and lose color. Together with his partner Mark Taylor, Sumner studies how microfibers from household clothes end up in the sea.

Although he argues that washing clothes less frequently is the right choice for the environment, he does not advocate a complete suspension of washing machines.

“We don’t want people to think they can’t wash things because they’re destroying the planet. It’s about trying to strike the right balance“Sumner told BBC Culture.

Washing clothes is important for hygienic and medical reasons for eczema sufferers trying to avoid irritation caused when our skin’s natural bacteria multiply inside our clothes.

It is also important for people’s self-esteem “not to feel ashamed of their clothes because they are dirty or smell bad.”

Regarding washing habits, he does not recommend a specific one. Ordinary citizens use different wash temperatures, wash cycles, and color and fabric combinations, and scientists themselves are no different.

Choosing the right program is key to preserving clothes. (GETTY IMAGES).

“I’ve been working with textiles for 30 years and I should know to separate cottons from synthetics and whites from colours, but frankly I don’t have the time.”

The best approach, apparently, is to be flexible. “If your clothes don’t smell bad, don’t bother washing them.advises Sumner.

“And when you go to wash it, be clear about what to do so that the garment is clean, but in the most effective way.”

Suggest washing clothes at lower temperatures or with very short cycles no detergent.

Also, doing laundry too often eats up hours of life, and not everyone has the time to spare.

“I’m very interested in sustainability, the environment and natural resource management, but I’m also concerned about my time,” says Chelsea Harry.

Szabo also worries about sustainability, but says she has other reasons for giving up overzealous cleaning habits.

“I have other things to do,” he says. “I have a dog to walk.”

*Article adapted from the original by Matilda Welin for BBC Culture

Source: Elcomercio