Hasta La Ideas

Everyone needs some sort of laundry hamper or laundry bag if the dirty clothes (and other items needing laundering) aren’t going to just wind up on the floor or tossed over a chair. And a well-designed product can make laundry management easier.

There are lots of laundry sorters with separate sections for lights and darks. The Sabichi light and darks laundry basket has a visual cue as to which side is which—a nice touch, and good for use with children who aren’t yet reading.

Brabantia has stackable laundry boxes that open from the top or the side—a handy design for end users with limited floor space. The boxes can be stacked up to three high. They come in four colors, so different colors can be used for different types of laundry (lights, darks, hand wash, dry cleaning, etc.).

Wenko has another space-saving approach, with its Escala laundry bin. It’s just a bit easier to toss laundry into these bins because there is no lid; that will make a difference to some end users. 

And each bin can be removed to carry to or from the laundry room or laundromat.

Not all end users will feel the need for multiple bins to sort their laundry, but they might appreciate some other features. The Candy laundry bin from Wenko also serves as a stool. For end users who can really use a stool in the same room as their laundry bin, this could be a handy dual-purpose product.

The Candy laundry bin comes with a detachable laundry bag, making it easy to haul the laundry to the washing machine.

The Ninfea laundry holder from Guzzini, designed by Roberto Giacomucci, is made from 10 polypropylene petals attached to a base. The space between the petals provides ventilation, which helps prevent mold and mildew. And of course the polypropylene is easy to clean. The one drawback some purchasers noted is that it can be a bit wobbly.

End users in small spaces might appreciate the Laundry Nook door-hanging hamper from Urban Mom. The hole at the top makes it easy to put dirty clothes inside (except for short or wheelchair-bound people dealing with tall doors) and there’s a zipper along the bottom on the reverse side to let everything tumble out easily. 

Some end users will prefer laundry baskets over hampers, partly because baskets allow folded items to be carried back after the laundry is done. The Must-Be-Neat laundry sorter is a tote that lines a standard laundry basket. There’s a mesh drawstring top to keep everything in place—even if laundry is piled high in the basket. The fixed compartments keep smaller items visible, but will also reduce the available space for those who only have larger items.

The Must-Be-Neat allows laundry to be carried one-handed while still in the basket.

And when the Must-Be-Neat is removed from whatever basket is being used, the end user has a tote that allows laundry to be carried hands-free (assuming it stays on the end user’s shoulder) when a basket might be awkward.

The Cloze basket is a current Kickstarter; it has until Nov. 15 to be funded. The three stacking baskets are each 6.3 inches tall, which seems a bit small. But the baskets each have a folding base, so they can be combined to make one larger laundry basket. 

The baskets can then be separated, with completed and folded laundry divided up however makes sense to make it easier to put things away.

While this seems interesting at first glance, I’m trying to find a good use case. I don’t see the Cloze basket as a great solution for a multi-person household (with multiple bedrooms) because in such cases it’s usually best to have a laundry basket or bin in each bedroom rather than a central one. And it’s not good for sorting things like light vs. dark clothes, because stacking and unstacking the baskets would get tedious. I guess end users could separate clothes that go away in different drawers as they do the folding, which some might find useful.

Speaking of folding: When folding and stacking clothes on top of a dryer (as many of us do), it’s easy to have something like a sock go flying to the floor. The Haus Maus laundry guard is designed to prevent such problems for those with front-loading machines. The guard comes in four sections; it can be used on one machine (with one section left over) or on two machines sitting right next to each other. It attaches with magnets. 

This is a simple, inelegant product—but it solves a real problem for some end users.