can we talk alternatives to tumble driers??? clever ideas for drying without taking up all the space in your house?

[Heathcliffscathy]

do i have to get a tumble drier, I'd really rather not! or is that the only way of not having huge racks of clothes that fill up a whole room? is there anything clever in terms of racks that are built into boiler cupboards or something that i'm missing???

We just have 3 clothes horses. and very occasionally dry outside but mostly not cos then you have to go and fetch it back again and we're a bit lazy.

I have this suspicion that we do a lot less washing than most people, even despite having 3 small children who used to be in washable nappies, cos 3 clothes horses is quite enough and we don't seem to have a problem with damp house or endless drying washing everywhere.

You just need to lower your standards. In the cause of saving the environment, naturally.

Our dehumidifier has changed our lives!

Makes the laundry dry much faster, creating space for the next batch, uses way less electricity than a TDer. Also it has fixed damp walls in the house and takes up little space. I think our cost about £100 from Amazon.

i don't have a damp house, and our ceilings are very low. we can fit the overhead airer oin above tha stairs tho

I have a clothes line in my garage. Thick things like towels do take a day or two when it's really cold but mostly things dry well out there.

Buttercup - do you wake up in the morning resembling a mummified Egyptian? I'm interested because we live in a basement flat and have a bit of a damp problem, so wondering whether a dehumidifer might be a way to solve it. Dry laundry would be an added bonus of course.

MNE it does say on the instructions that you can overdo it and end up a bit itchy!

We don't sleep in the same room though, and to be honest if your walls are damp then there must be a lot of moisture in the air already, enough to suck a lot out and there to still be some.

I have never awoken with chapped lips and crispy skin, if that helps!

I no longer have a drier and use a combination of radiators for socks and undies, a folding clothes drier for t-shirts, trousers, and hangers in my conservatory for shirts. Bedding and towels are dried over the bannisters.
I don't regret getting rid of it. Most stuff doesn't need ironing if it is dried on a hanger.

Our dehum has an auto setting where it will turn off if the incoming air is below a certain humidity level - so no chance of mummification

We have an overhead one but ours came from b&Q and cost a whole £5!! Holds about 3 times the amount of the lakeland one too and looks a bit more modern.

We put ours in the utility room so height isn't too much of an issue, good job as I tend to put shirts on hangers and hang them off it and can easily fit a weeks worth of school uniform, casual clothes and underwear for 3 kids on when I wash at the weekend. . I do have an extractor fan in the utility room which helps the drying.

haven't read whole thread so sorry if am doubling up

we had a boiler cupboard. it was great. we put two hanging rails in it so can hang clothes 2 deep. we put a towel rack on the back of the door too. sometimes a put little things on a drying rack that fits inside the cupboard. clothes dry in no time (in the winter when the heating is on).

when our boiler was replaced by a combi boiler that doesn't store heat, we got a small radiator installed in that cupboard and that does the trick.

Thanks buttercup (and sorry for the hijack, soph); we don't have damp in the walls as such, but we do have mould , which sort of appears here and there (not on the walls either). The problem was actually only apparent in the summer, funnily enough; I think because the heating was off for a few months, and it was warm and wet. Anyway, good to know that one can dehumidify without desiccating.

I still want a pulley though. B&Q you say flaime? Must check it out.

We live in an old Victorian house with no central heating but with two gas fires downstairs. Dry all washing outside in spring and summer and this winter am so tempted to get a tumble dryer. Last year was difficult and we were at the laundrette most weekends for a couple of hours just to dry stuff and really don't want to be doing that this year. We are quite environmentally friendly so i am well aware that a tumble is not good and we have lots of clothes horses but we couldn't use one of those hanging from the ceiling things cos we don't have much hot air in this house.

I assuage my environmental guilt at using a tumble drier by having a green electricity supplier.
Costs us about an extra £40pa compared to their normal tariff, so not masses, and all my electricity is handwoven by fairies generated hydroelectrically in Scotland

depending on your cupboard arrangments, could you put up a couple of poles in the top of your airing cupboard & hang damp things on coat hangers to dry? Nothing needs ironing that way either!

i have a tumble drier but no car, so i dont feel guilty. I dont know how i managed without it!

My house is tiny. There is no room in my kitchen for a washer let alone a dryer. But we do have a tiny passage between the kitchen and bathroom. My tumble dryer sits on top of my washer in that passage.

Would it be possible to do similar in your house? It cost next to nothing to create a new washer point and the waste goes down the same pipe as the bath.

I hang all our clothes up onto clothes hangers and then hang them on the curtain rail in our dining room (I also hang them on our washing line on the hangers) they dry fairly quickly/well, don't need ironing and take seconds to put away. In the depths of non-drying weather I resort to the tumble drier for the pants, socks etc otherwise the go on those clippy circular sock/pant hangers that you can buy.

We're a family of 6 in small house and it works well for us.

I heart my tumble dryer. No more clothes strewn all over the house for days on end, and visitors having to look at DH's pants on the radiator. Lovely.