to ask how often you wash your curtains?

[ThankGodItsAlmostSpringTime]

Mine are put in with the towels and bedsheets on their annual wash.

AIBU to be minging?

[fourquenelles]

My family live close to a Next seconds shop so when I visit I buy new curtains at a ridiculous price for my French doors (only curtains in the house). Saves any washing and it's good to ring the changes. Btw ridiculous price = less than £25 for 60 x 90s

[garlicbreathing]

"Mine are put in with the towels and bedsheets on their annual wash."

I hope the towels and bedsheets are done more often than annually!

[wonkylegs]

Never they would shrink/ disintegrate. They are not made from washable fabrics.
They are hoovered every 2 months though.

[Ragwort]

Never washed them 30 years old

[DaphneWhitethigh]

To some extent it depends how near the road you live. We live on a relatively quiet road but with no front garden. The net curtains soak up the road dust so they genuinely do need washing - ideally more than the once a year I give them. The back window curtains don't get nearly so dirty.

If you lived on a main road then unless you had treble glazing at the front that you never ever opened your curtains would get properly filthy.

[toptomatoes]

I will wash them when they look dirty. So far, never.

[Raia]

I can't reach mine to get them down: will they be full of dust mites and fungus?

[iyamehooru]

Never. You shouldn't wash them.

[RatOnnaStick]

I think I did the living room curtains when we moved, (8 years ago). None of the others have ever needed it.

[HippyPottyMouth]

I washed the spare room ones after the cat had a gory altercation with a bird. Other than that, only when we moved house. The curtains in the new house didn't look ever so clean either so
I didn't feel skanky until I read this thread.

[megletthesecond]

I've washed the dc's ikea curtains a couple of times in 10 yrs.

The rest of the house, never. They'd need dry cleaning anyway.

[Footle]

I washed some recently after someone had been vaping intensively in a bedroom for many weeks. Had to be done.

[Savagebeauty]

Mine have been up ten years and never washed it cleaned. I sporadically Hoover them.
My floor to ceiling lounge ones have been dry cleaned once in 19 years. They shrank 2 inches so I thought fuck that.
And yet I wash sheets every week, towels every 3 days and wear most things just once .

[DaphneWhitethigh]

But yes, if you have ones with blackout linings then you can't wash or dry clean them - learned that the hard way.

[soundsystem]

Haha this is a source of disagreement between DH and I. I come from a Summer curtains and Winter curtains family, so they get washed when they get changed. When we moved in together We got nice thick grey (to me, Winter, curtains) and I mentioned getting Summer ones. This was a completely new concept to him and he found it hilarious.

His parents run a fabric shop that makes/sells curtains and they swear most people only have one set per room. I asked "but what do they do when they're washing them?" And they fell about laughing!

Oh and I haven't washed ours in two years of being in the house. DH hoovers them though!

So in theory I believe that they should be washed annually when changed to your Summer curtains but in practice, um, never.

[HungryHorace]

I washed some once. They shrank. Lesson learned.

[thenewaveragebear1983]

Never. Apart from one minor deviaition- please see my other thread entitled 'does anyone know if I can 'unshrink' curtains' from last week.

[bornwithaplasticspoon]

Once a year in the summer so I can hang them out. They're all cotton, mostly Ikea, and wash well. The house feels and smells wonderful once they're all done.

[Thisismyalias]

Never. And don't dry clean thermal or blackout curtains, there is a good chance that the backing will split and melt, it'll ruin the curtains and the dry cleaners machines.

[lazyarse123]

Nets once a year, used to do living room ones every year but there's two sets both with separate linings and they are a bastard to iron and put back up so not been done for 3 years. Never done bedrooms.

[Roystonv]

I can remember the routine of winter and summer curtains from my childhood twas quite reassuring and orderly! I just have blinds so apart from the odd dead fly sandwich in the roller type not much cleaning here. Second MrsMorton

[nattyknitter]

I do the porch door one every few weeks because the dog gets it muddy when she comes in from a walk. It's too long and I am too lazy to take it up.

I don't bother with the rest of mine, but my mother gets annoyed and turns up with a steam cleaner every once in a while and steams them for me.

This is the woman who had at least 3 sets of curtains per window - winter, summer and she was bored/they were a bargain. She washes them roughly every 2 months.

In the interest of full disclosure, she changes her bedding weekly, washes towels every 3 days, clothes after each wearing and does wear underwear in bed. I'm starting to think I was adopted

[FinallyFreeFromItAll]

Never washed curtains. I don't think an other wise clean home needs them doing.

Although landlord had had them all laundered and apologised that they no longer had curtains for half of the windows - those were the ones too filthy to even launder! The last tenants were disgusting though the whole house was thick with grime - and I mean thick. It took two people (inc a professional cleaner) four whole days just to make the place fit for human habitation (still not fully clean), so I could move in. Even the internal doors had to be scrubbed with a scrubbing brush to get the thick black residue off! The walls had to be sugar soaped and scrubbed to get the slimy greasy residues off them. The carpets shampooed 3 times. That's surely the only kind of house curtains end up mucky in?

[NotJimbo]

Every 5 years or so. Def wash them on a cool cycle tho as they may well shrink. My living room curtains must have gone longer than that tho, I just washed them now and they came out about 3 shades lighter, they must have v gradually became really minging.

Not sure if/how you'd wash ones with blackout linings.