What to do with grotty white towels?

shandyclover

My granny gave me lots of towels when she redecorated her bathroom. Most of them were lovely and white with pink embroidery on the edges, after 6 mos in our household, and a few times of being thrown in the back of the car for surfing trips (against my expressed instructions I may add!) they've gone a bit grey and yucky looking.

I've tried washing them with bleach but doesn't seem to do much. We use the Lidl chamomile and lavender 2in1 detergent and usually does all our washing no problem but doesn't seem to be having much effect on our white towels. Should I invest in some branded detergent just for the towels, or maybe get a packet of dylon and dye them all? I don't want to throw them out as they are all very good quality and should last us for years yet but I also don't want to be too embarrassed to hang them up!

Aarons_mummy

I would get some dye and just change the colour saves wasting them!

Memory_Girl

Agree with the dye - choose a "surf friendly" colour - did our "beach" towels bright red so that we can find them easily and ................. any towel left festering in the car can be easily seen, not that you would ever be so slovenly you understand:D

MG

BitterAndTwisted

If you don't want to dye them and would rather have clean and white towels I would try and ungrotty them first. Don't bung them in the washing-machine with bleach try soaking them overnight in a plastic bucket with a dilute bleach-solution instead. If you have Napisan add that to the washing-machine or one of those peroxide/oxy additives to a VERY HOT WASH after your soaking. Now, where can you get that Reckitt's Blue-Bag stuff for brightening whites? Not seen that in an age.

Stephen_Leak

A good soak in diluted Stardrops, and an environmentally unfriendly hot wash.

PipneyJane

Stephen_Leak wrote: »

A good soak in diluted Stardrops, and an environmentally unfriendly hot wash.

I know this has been asked before but what is this magical "Stardrops" and where do you buy it, please? I keep seeing references but I've never seen a bottle. Thanks.

ragz_2

Give them a wash with biological powder (no higher than 60) and then hang on the line on a sunny (:rotfl:) day. My washable nappies are still white and this is how I wash them...

Stephen_Leak

PipneyJane wrote: »

I know this has been asked before but what is this magical "Stardrops" and where do you buy it, please? I keep seeing references but I've never seen a bottle. Thanks.

It's a concentrated soap-free detergent, first marketed during WW2. It can shift Staines from Middlesex, as they say. It's available in pound shops, and some supermarkets (although usually 'hidden' at floor level).

http://www.thorntonandross.co.uk/household/stardrops.html

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/354039

soon2bjobless

Dye em.......I always buy white towels at first (usually because I get a good deal on them) and then dye them a pale colour - usually blue - which when they get a bit tired looking I can dye them either a darker blue or eventually navy - I have had some towels for years and years by doing this.

katiecoodle

I'm always amazed by my mother in laws whites - they don't seem to go grey ever, at all, after lots of washes. Her tip? Line dry them on a sunny day. Let the sun do the bleaching.

Eliza_2

I imagine all this horrible snow that's around at the moment would help bleach stuff too. But I'm another vote for dyeing - I dye stuff all the time, it's so easy to do in the machine and doubles the length of life to - well, everything actually!!! Have now got lots of knickers the same shade of blue, white tshirts that went a bit grey are now a lovely dark green, sheets now pink - it's the best. Or you could get creative and tie-die your towels, that would be good. Or paint stripes or pretty flowers to match your bathroom?

Hmm, that gives me an idea, where's that dog!