To ask you a very boring but important question?

[Peaspleaselouise]

I need new towels. DH and I have had our trusty old bath towels for donkeys years but they’re the best ever - soft, big, absorbent...

But the time has come for new ones, the old ones are getting embarrassing.

Recommendations please for best places to buy towels that will fulfil all my criteria?!

John Lewis or White Company, but look out for sale bargains as they are pricey. DS2 was born into a White Company towel - the other of the pair is still going strong 12 years later (towel, that is, not baby, there was only one at a time of those!)

Soak and sleep.

Not Dunrlm our last from there did not stay fluffy at all

Christy towels - they just get better and better with washing. If you Ebay search, you can find them at great prices.

We got ours from Wilko, big and soft and have lasted well so far.

HomeSense - I like the DKNY ones and the bath sheets are huge and go round my large dh.

Just got DS a Ralph Lauren set this week too .

I have some 20 year old Christy ones, but those jumbo bath sheets at the top of the thread look fab.

The IKEA bath sheets are fab, and even go round me!

Bestseller White vinegar instead of fabric conditioner in the washing machine and line drying works very well for me.

Dunelm ones are crap. I like the White Company towels

Shameless place mark. Also need new towels

It depends how you like them. I like a towel to be a bit rough because I think they dry you better. I don't like them to be all soft and fluffy.

I think most of mine have come from Wilkos or B&M, maybe a couple from Tesco.

My son bought a bath sheet in Dunelm last week. £18. Fucking unbelievable. At that price I want it to clean the bathroom too!

I hate big fluffy cloud towels.
I like thin scratchy Baloo the bear type towels.

Thick fluffy towels trap moisture, you can't do the back violin thing.
I bought 6 six ultra thin towels back from living in Thailand.

Brilliant,.

Supplementary question: how do you care for your towels? I find that well before mine wear out they become like cardboard. Is the towels or the way that I wash them?

Just a reminder that your local women’s refuge always needs towels if you are getting rid of useable ones...

I like Christie towels.

I wash my towels on their own at 60, with powder or liquid with half the amount of fabric condition or none. Line or clothes horse dry. They stay nice.

Wilko 'Best' or Primark 'Luxury'

Good to see that I'm not alone in liking hard scratchy towels Fortunately both DH and I feel the same way - we want to be able to feel that we are towelling ourselves dry!

I just recently bought 8 Egyptian cotton hand towels online and they are lovely, but my favourite bath sheet is getting a bit thin now. It has been washed nearly every week since I bought it when my youngest daughter was a baby. She will be 41 next month. I bought it from the market, and I remember the trader telling me it would last me until she grew up!

My Christy and Jeff Banks towels are 15 years old and still soft, fluffy and look like new.

EggysMom - brilliant!

Sorry to go slightly off-topic but what do you do with your old towels? We could do with replacing a few of our old ones but it feels wasteful to just chuck them. Can they go in the clothes recycling banks? Any other uses?

John Lewis for me even the basic towels are very good.

Next however are shite. I consigned a red set down to the caravan because even after about 6 years they still fucking shed!

Women’s refuges and refugee charities always need towels so long as they’re not stained/ripped.

Pet shelters take stained/ripped ones to use for bedding.

Otherwise a lot of charity shops take rags as they make money from selling rags on for use in insulation etc.

Dog shelters always need towels.