Air-Drying: 6 Benefits & The Fabrics It Works Best On

Weekends are laundry days. I am lucky to have in-unit laundry in my apartment (consider it a rarity in NYC), but it’s always nice to save a little extra when I can quickly dry my clothes at home. Another plus is not having to sweat profusely while grabbing my clothes from the dryer. In the summertime, I have a window fan that runs a pleasant breeze through my garment rack. With this simple, sustainable set-up, I can dry my clothes without a dryer in no time.

ON MY RACK: CLOTHES I AM DRYING WITHOUT A DRYER

*This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase after clicking on a link, I may earn a small commission at no added cost to you.

Links: Madewell cotton high-waist shorts, Slip Silk Marble Pillowcase, Old Navy Performance Tank. All perfect to air-dry!

This old-fashioned technique brings many natural benefits, and here are 6 reasons air-drying works!

1. It saves you money and energy.

In most homes, the dryer is the second-most energy intensive appliance, runner-up to the refrigerator. So even if you don’t ‘pay’ for laundry, you are significantly lowering your carbon footprint by air-drying.

2. It prevents static cling.

Ugh, this one is another pet peeve of mine. You know that annoying feeling when your load is done, and you have to peel every single shirt apart like Velcro? It’s static cling. The tumbling action from dryers causes fabrics to build up electrostatic charge. However, air-drying solves this issue.

3. It is much gentler than tumble drying.

You can lay your clothes on a rack, or hang them up. Whatever the choice, air drying is much gentler than machine drying, which uses abrasive tumbling action. Over time, the process will wear down and even warp the fabric.

4. It reduces wrinkles.

Under heat, the chemical bonds in fibers become flexible to move around. During the cool-down, the structure can easily set in the form of wrinkles. Creases are also more likely to form if your dryer load contains both heavy and lightweight fabrics. With air-drying, your fabrics are left to hang and dry naturally.

5. It prevents unwanted shrinkage.

Similar to the science in point 4, clothes often shrink in the dryer because heat causes fibers to ‘retreat’ back to their relaxed state. Another great point is that heat can also melt and degrade spandex, so clothes become less ‘stretchy’ over time.

6. It preserves color.

Since tumble drying can be an abrasive process, fabrics can easily ‘crock.’ Crocking is defined as color transfer when a fabric is subject to abrasion. Meanwhile, at the molecular level, heat can also cause certain dyes to lose their ‘attraction’ to the fiber, or degrade the dye particles themselves.

The gradual process of air-drying is of no doubt better for our clothes in the long run. However, you may have a lot of clothes, and there is no way (or space) to air-dry them all.

How do you pick the best fabrics to air-dry?

Natural Fabrics: Think cotton, linen, wool, cashmere. These are known to shrink in the dryer, and you should never throw woolens in the dryer anyways!

Quick-Dry Fabrics: This one is pretty straight-forward. Why put your clothes in the dryer when they already dry quickly on their own? Example: exercise clothes.

Delicates: Lightweight fabrics such as satin, crepe, chiffon, anything with lace. Lingerie. These materials can easily snag and get damaged in the dryer.

Anything with a lot of spandex: As I mentioned before, spandex can break down under high heat and damage your clothes. (e.g. swimsuits, shapewear products, hoisery – also a delicate, denim)

Color-Rich Fabrics: Denim, or any fabrics that you know will bleed onto other fabrics. Under heat, these materials can transfer color onto another fabric.

For additional resources on drying your clothes at home, please read these articles from The Spruce, or Cleancult.