Dressing gowns, slippers, and the clothes worn only at home are the least considered laundry in the house. They get worn more hours than anything else, they sit against skin, they almost never get washed on a schedule, and they are usually made of exactly the materials that hold odour worst.
How often these actually need washing
The honest answer is more often than most households manage.
A dressing gown worn after a shower over clean skin can go a week or two. One worn over clothes all evening, or first thing before a shower, needs washing weekly.
Anything worn against bare skin gets the same treatment as a towel, meaning every few uses rather than every few weeks.
Slippers need washing monthly at minimum if they are washable, and airing daily regardless.
House clothes, meaning the tracksuit or leggings that never leave the building, need washing as often as any other worn garment. The fact that they have not been outside does not make them clean.
Robes, by material
The fabric decides everything and dressing gowns come in four common ones.
Cotton terry is the towelling kind. It washes warm, needs a full rinse, and takes fabric softener badly for the same reason towels do, since softener coats the loops and stops it absorbing.
Waffle weave is lighter cotton and washes the same way, and it dries far faster.
Fleece and microfibre robes wash cold or warm on gentle and must be dried on low. High heat mats the pile permanently and can melt the fibre. No softener, since it flattens the nap.
Silk and satin robes are hand wash or gentle in a mesh bag, cool water, no wringing, dried flat away from heat.
Waffle and terry can take a hot wash occasionally, which is worth doing every few months to deal with the body oil that accumulates.
The belt and the pockets
Two small things that cause most of the damage.
Tie the belt loosely around the robe or take it out entirely before washing. A loose belt in a drum wraps around everything else and pulls it into a knot, which is how sleeves get stretched.
Empty the pockets. A dressing gown pocket accumulates tissues, and a tissue through a wash cycle coats an entire load in white fragments that take three cycles to clear.
Turn the robe inside out, which protects the outer face and gets the collar and cuffs, where the body oil actually is, facing outward.
Slippers, which most people never wash
Check whether they are washable before anything else, since a great many are not.
For washable fabric slippers, use a mesh bag, cold or warm water on gentle, and a small dose of mild detergent.
Never put slippers in a dryer. The heat destroys the shape, shrinks the lining, and melts glued soles. Air dry them, stuffed loosely with paper to hold the shape.
Sheepskin and leather slippers cannot be machine washed. Clean the interior with a cloth dampened with a solution of water and a little white vinegar, and use a suede brush on the outside.
Memory foam soles should not be soaked, since the foam holds water for days and breaks down.
For anything unwashable, bicarbonate of soda sprinkled inside overnight and vacuumed out in the morning handles most of the smell.
Air them every day rather than leaving them under the bed. Slippers develop odour for exactly the same reason shoes do, and the fix is drying rather than cleaning.
The odour problem specifically
House clothes hold smell more than outdoor clothes and there is a reason for it.
They are worn for long stretches at low activity, which produces slow steady sweat and body oil rather than a burst of it.
They are often synthetic, particularly fleece and polyester loungewear, and synthetic fibres hold body oil in a way cotton does not.
And they get hung back up rather than put in a hamper, so nothing ever prompts a wash.
For anything that already smells, soak in warm water with half a cup of washing soda for an hour, then wash with an enzyme detergent and two extra rinses.
Reduce the detergent dose going forward, since residue holds oil and makes the next wear smell sooner.
Air garments after wearing rather than folding them straight away, which handles a surprising amount.
Storage between seasons
Wash everything before it goes away, without exception. Body oil left in fabric for months oxidises into yellow marks that will not come out and attracts insects.
Store completely dry, in a breathable container rather than a sealed plastic one.
Keep it out of a basement or an unheated space, since temperature swings and damp are what produce mustiness.
Do not store anything starched or with softener residue on it, both of which yellow over time.
The Fargo part
Two local conditions make this category matter more here than almost anywhere.
The heating season is the first and it is long. Homes here run heat for six months or more, which means the winter is largely spent indoors in exactly these garments. A dressing gown or a set of house clothes here gets far more wear hours per year than the same garment in a mild climate, which is the argument for a proper washing schedule rather than washing when they look dirty.
The dry indoor air that comes with a long heating season is the second factor and it works both ways. It means these garments dry fast, so the correct methods, air drying slippers and drying fleece on low, are practical rather than a two day inconvenience. It also means a great deal of static, particularly on fleece and polyester loungewear, and the instinct to reach for softener or dryer sheets should be resisted since both coat the pile and flatten it. Wool dryer balls and taking the load out slightly damp handle it without that cost.
Dry air also means skin gets drier and more moisturiser gets used, which is worth knowing because lotion and oil transfer readily into a robe and are a large part of what accumulates in one over a winter. That is the case for the occasional hot wash on cotton terry.
Where a bulky robe load fits
A cotton terry robe holds an enormous amount of water and a household’s worth of house clothes is a bulky load that compresses rather than tumbles in a small drum.
The machines at our self-service laundry on 45th Street South take heavy terry with room to move and enough water volume to rinse body oil out properly rather than leaving it in the loops.
Our machines and the store are cleaned daily.
Our wash-dry-fold service covers the everyday laundry.
For general washing guidance, The American Cleaning Institute publishes a laundry basics guide that is a useful cross-check.
The short version
Robes, slippers, and house clothes get more wear hours than anything else you own and almost never get washed on a schedule. Wash a robe worn over bare skin every few uses and one worn over clothes weekly, matching the method to the fabric: warm with a full rinse for terry, cold and gentle with low heat for fleece, and no fabric softener on either. Tie the belt and empty the pockets before it goes in. Slippers go in a mesh bag if washable and never in a dryer, and get aired daily. For anything that already smells, soak with washing soda and cut the detergent dose going forward.
WaveMAX Fargo is at 2551 45th St S, easy to reach from Fargo and the surrounding area. If a heavy robe load needs a bigger machine, call us at 701-707-0621.