# How to not shrink t-shirts **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 10, 2007, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499 "2007-12-10T17:44:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Cluricaun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/bb73d2/32.png) [@Cluricaun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cluricaun)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2007, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/1 "2007-12-10T17:44:17Z")
This really isn’t heady enough for GQ, but I go through t-shirts like they’re damned near disposable. Not graphic ones meant to show your Jethro Tull allegiance, I mean the undershirt kind. I’ll buy a new pack of Hanes or Fruit of the loom white crew neck shirts, and they’re not exactly cheap but they’ll last maybe two or three washings for me before they’re shrunk up and the collar is all stretched out. Is there a better way I can be laundering these to make them last longer, or do they just wear out really fast on purpose so I have to keep buying them? Would using cold water instead of hot in the wash cycle be better? Really any laundry tips for t’s would be appreciated. ---
**Author:** ![tremorviolet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e47774/32.png) [@tremorviolet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tremorviolet)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2007, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/2 "2007-12-10T17:48:31Z")
Don’t put them in the dryer, hang 'em up. It’s a pain in the ass but it’s the dryer heat that shrinks them, not the washing. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2007, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/3 "2007-12-10T18:09:09Z")
**tremorviolet** is right. I don’t put any cotton t-shirts in the dryer, as mama taught me. I just hang them up. Now, of course, this requires a little space and planning (got to have hangers with you in the laundry room!) but that’s the answer. ---
**Author:** ![Cluricaun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/bb73d2/32.png) [@Cluricaun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cluricaun)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2007, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/4 "2007-12-10T18:29:16Z")
No, I already air dry a bunch of my stuff so I can totally add t-shirts to the mix. I should have thought of that before, but for some reason I was convinced that it was the washing machine that was doing it. Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2007, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/5 "2007-12-11T00:29:25Z")
Buy 'em way too big, and they’ll never shrink. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2007, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/6 "2007-12-11T01:04:01Z")
[QUOTE=ZipperJJ] **tremorviolet** is right. I don’t put any cotton t-shirts in the dryer, as mama taught me. I just hang them up. Now, of course, this requires a little space and planning (got to have hangers with you in the laundry room!) but that’s the answer. [/QUOTE] I only have problems with the cheap white t-shirts shrinking in a dryer. I’ve found that with the more expensive ones (the colored ones that can be used as a top layer and which presumably come pre-shrunk) I generally don’t have any problems with shrinking the shirts unless the dryer is also dangerously hot. (As I have to do all my laundry at a laundromat, that has happened in the past until I’ve learned the tricks of the dryer in question.) ---
**Author:** ![Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Purl_McKnittington)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2007, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/7 "2007-12-11T03:03:44Z")
About the collars being stretched out of shape – how do you take your shirts off? Do you do it the “man” way by tugging at the collar to pull it over your head, or do you do it the “woman” way by lifting from the bottom? If you do it the first way, stop. Even if it’s a knit, tugging it off that way will distort the fabric and mess with the collar seam. Cotton doesn’t have much memory, so it doesn’t spring back the way other fabrics do. ---
**Author:** ![wolf\_in\_second\_hand\_clothing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/9d8465/32.png) [@wolf\_in\_second\_hand\_clothing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolf_in_second_hand_clothing)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2007, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/8 "2007-12-11T07:15:53Z")
[QUOTE=Miss Purl McKnittington] or do you do it the “woman” way by lifting from the bottom? [/QUOTE] That’s the woman way? Aw, man. Oh well, I wear v-necks anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Purl_McKnittington)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2007, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/9 "2007-12-12T00:05:57Z")
Heh. I’m not actually into gendering the way we take off our shirts, but I’ve seen it described that way on the boards before, and the general consensus was that “tug by the collar” was the man way. Call it the mangoose way, if you want, and the other way the cobra way. It doesn’t make you less of a man to take your shirt off bottom up. ---
**Author:** ![Cluricaun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/bb73d2/32.png) [@Cluricaun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cluricaun)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2007, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/10 "2007-12-12T01:57:45Z")
Success! My shirts are as right sized as they were out of the package. I swear, I dry less and less stuff lately. Still it’s nice to have to warm up my socks and underwear in the morning before I get dressed. Yeah, I have odd morning habits. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![TheLoadedDog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/35a633/32.png) [@TheLoadedDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheLoadedDog)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2007, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/11 "2007-12-12T14:39:59Z")
I know this has been covered before, but there is a cultural divide at play here… To me, “clothes dryer” means “the thing you use if you _reeeally_ have to, because you’re out of clean stuff and it’s raining.” Your “horrible crinkly rough” clothes are my “smells like fresh air and sunshine” ones. Dryer-dried clothes to me, are always kind of… not sure how to describe it. I do appreciate their warmth in the depths of winter, but otherwise it’s like comparing recycled air conditioning to a mountain breeze. I’d never thought of line-dried clothes as “crunchy” until I read about it on these boards. I suppose they are - for about five seconds of wearing. Seriously, if you get into the habit of line drying, it’s only a minute or so to hang stuff out, it saves your electricity bill (and the environment if you’re that way inclined), and it’s just _so much nicer_ (which is my only real motivation). I have Hanes T’s that are over five years old, possibly nearing ten. They’re getting threadbare and 'orrible, but they ain’t shrunk. ---
**Author:** ![Lionne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Lionne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lionne)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2007, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-not-shrink-t-shirts/429499/12 "2007-12-12T17:43:02Z")
[QUOTE=Miss Purl McKnittington] About the collars being stretched out of shape – how do you take your shirts off? Do you do it the “man” way by tugging at the collar to pull it over your head… [/QUOTE] Nothing like a sexy man unclothing in a way that shows off all his back and arm muscles. ~sigh~