Drying clothes indoors w/wood heat

I've seen many on this forum talk about it so my wife and I decided we'd try it - wow does it work well!

We have a stackable frontloader which left enough room in the laundry room for a 5' long shelf with a closet rod to hang things on for drying. We have been pulling out any shirts/pants/towels and other bulkier items and hanging them while leaving a few smaller items in the washer. After a few hours, the clothes hanging are completely dry, but a little crunchy if cotton based fabric. We toss them into the dryer with the smaller damp items from the washer and in about 10 minutes, they're all done, and soft from the short dryer/steaming cycle. Cuts about 80% of the dryer time from what I can tell.

I wasn't sure it would work well because our laundry room is upstairs down a hall on the other end of the house from the downstairs woodstove, but I guess the humidty is so incredibly low that things dry really fast. We also run an open top steamer on the stove 24x7.

Anyway, if you've considered trying it, give it a shot - we will do this a lot in the winter now.

-Colin

Gives the room a nice, fresh smell, too. You can still find those wooden clothes drying racks. They work well, and can be used for kindling in a pinch.

Actually, I should have mentioned we have one of those sitting under the hangers and it does indeed help.

I was concerned we'd get dripping onto the rack, but the front-loader spins things fairly dry to start, and I think the air is just too dry for anything to start puddling up/dripping.

-Colin

We put up a retractable clothesline (Home Depot) in my utility/laundry room that's in the basement with the stove. I also have a front loader and I put Downy in the fabric softener cup. Then I put the clothes in the dryer for 8 to 10 mins. at medium/high heat to get the wrinkles out, put the shirts on plastic hangars on the line and hang pants over the line. I use a wooden dowel dryer for socks and undies. Works like a charm and the clothes are soft like out of the dryer.