At a time when sustainability and environmental awareness are becoming increasingly important, we are looking for alternatives to conventional appliances that waste energy and resources. One of the devices that can play a role in this is the clothes steamer. By using your clothes steamer more often and skipping laundry, not only will your clothes last longer, but you will also be doing the environment a great service. In this blog we will discuss the eco-friendly benefits of using a clothes steamer.
1. Avoid wasting water
A fact that really shocked me when I first heard it: did you know that you use an average of about 60 liters of water with every wash? water consumed? Imagine 60 coke bottles. The average two-person household does 3 loads of laundry per week. This results in approximately 10,000 liters of water that you use annually for washing. Weird, isn't it?
The fashion designer Stella McCartney said in an interview with 'the Observer ' that she never washes her suits or takes them to the dry cleaners, and even added that you should wash as little as possible. You're right, because the impact of washing your clothes is, as you can read above, enormous. But should we stop washing our clothes altogether?
It happens so often that we throw our clothes in the laundry basket at the end of the day, even though they are not actually dirty at all. Unfortunately not really a sustainable habit...
2. Washing results in the release of microplastics
With every wash, up to 700,000 microplastics are released, which is extremely harmful to the environment. It is therefore better to wash your clothes as little as possible and it is not necessary to wash your clothes after wearing them once, with the exception of underwear, socks and clothes that have sweated a lot, of course.
But why do we all think this is necessary? The answer is simple: Smart marketing from detergent manufacturers. Mac Bishop, the founder of a clothing brand where you hardly have to wash the clothes, experienced it when he worked for the marketing team of Unilever: “ The only way to grow a detergent brand is to make people think that they have to do a lot. to wash . ”
3. Reduce energy and steam consumption
In addition to water consumption, there is the energy consumption of a washing machine, which is 80 to 90% determined by the temperature at which you wash. The higher the temperature, the more power you use. And high power consumption is - as we know - not only bad for mother earth, but also for your wallet.
Conclusion: washing less is good for the environment
If we massively adhere to Miss Stella McCartney's rule: “ If you don't absolutely have to wash it, don't wash it ”, we will save the environment a lot. An alternative to make your clothes smell fresher is to hang them outside for a few hours or steam them. The odors go away and if you make sure there are no stains, then you have no reason to wash it at all.
One of the fastest and most sustainable ways to freshen up clothes is to use a clothes steamer. Using hot steam, bacteria are eliminated and odors are removed from the fabric. This makes it ideal for freshening up clothes after a few wears, without making them dirty enough to need to be washed.
