How often do you change clothes?

Dear reader,

People don’t like to talk about this.

It’s kind of implicit. But no-one knows exactly what’s what…

So here we go:

We change our underwear (trunks, socks and undershirt) everyday.

Women can afford to change their tops every two days — though it depends on the season, and if they tend to sweat a lot.

We’re sure that some men can wear a shirt two days in a row, especially in winter, or if they’re hormones are tamed that day… It hardly ever happens to us.

We’ve noticed that aggressive antiperspirant help to keep clothes longer. The more natural your deodorant, the more smelly your shirt at the end of the day.

Choose your evil

It’s a trade off: either you use a natural deodorant (or none at all) and wash clothes twice more (using twice more detergent), or you poison your skin with aggressive deodorants and save on washing up. We chose the former…

It’s mostly the smell under the arms which is unpleasant. And if you don’t change soon enough, this smell will contaminate your sweater (under the arms) or your jacket, suit, etc.

If this happens, rather than washing your sweater every two days, we recommend just hanging your sweater/jacket somewhere where the air circulates.

We tend to wash sweaters every 10 wear. Cashmere wool likes being washed. Other fabrics not so much.

We would wash sweaters sooner when we’ve been sweating heavily underneath, or we have stained them.

We wash chino trousers every 10 wear, or if they’re stained, whichever comes first.

Jeans, every 20 wear. Some advocate washing jeans in cold water (no detergent). We haven’t noticed that jeans suffer that much for warm water and detergent. And we find it’s easier to throw them with the rest.

We don’t typically wash suits and suit trousers unless they’re stained or full of sweat (after a summer wedding). We’d rather steam them or let them breathe fresh air.

The issue is with dust that accumulates inside the seams. We feel that dry-cleaning a suit once a year is a minimum. By the way “dry-cleaning” does imply humidifying the cloth. It uses water and chemicals (but just not your typical detergent).

We wouldn’t wash a tie unless it’s stained.

We usually shower once a day (with soap). Sometimes, after the sauna, we will shower without soap.

Our body odour is quite strong. If we shower less than everyday, our clothes, and bed sheets give off a strong male odour that’s not particularly pleasant to us or to the wife. Yes, even we are able to smell it.

If you feel like you’re constantly having to fight off these strong smells, we sympathise…

Best regards,

Edward

PS: Last tip about washing — don't spin your washer faster than 600 revolutions per minute. Machines usually spin at 1200 and this decreases your clothes' life expectancy (especially shirt collars).