The Best Way to Pack Dirty Laundry, According to an Expert
Never dread opening your suitcase again.
After a few days into your trip, you’ve likely checked off some of the most anticipated activities on your itinerary—the exciting restaurant reservation, the beach day, whichever. By the end of your trip, you’ve gone through at least 75% of the underwear you’ve packed, and your socks have seen way, way better days.
The ideal solution is not to pack all of these stinky socks and underwear, plus the rest of your sweaty clothing with your souvenirs and the excess of clean underwear all back in the same suitcase. Avoiding a dirty laundry soup in your luggage that will be invariably difficult to unpack when you get home can be achieved, but it will require a bit of planning, like every other part of traveling.
According to Samantha Hamilton, an expert traveler who runs the New England Wanderlust blog, there is a correct way to pack your dirty laundry when traveling. Hamilton has been traveling for over 10 years, and has developed a simple and reliable system to keep your crusty socks away from the sweater you packed and never wore.
Use mesh-free packing cubes
“Keep your dirty laundry in a separate packing cube,” Hamilton said. But, it can’t just be any packing cube, as the standard mesh top will do nothing to contain the smell of the laundry. “The mesh, of course, will allow odors to leak out into the rest of your suitcase, and you definitely don't want that (a mistake I learned the hard way).”
Hamilton has tried a variety of the internet’s dirty laundry packing hacks over the years—garbage bags, canvas tote bags, and those large plastic compression bags, but says that packing cubes have been the most effective way to sequester the smell and maintain an element of the compression to save space.
“At the end of every trip, I found it grew increasingly more difficult to close my suitcase because I used packing cubes for everything else, and I didn't budget enough room for my dirty laundry to not stay compressed,” Hamilton said.
There are tons of packing tips on how to fold down standard laundry bags so that they don’t take up more space, but you can avoid trying to contort your laundry bag by having a specific packing cube designated for your laundry. You can find compression packing cubes without mesh on Amazon.
Keep your shoes and dirty laundry separate
You might be tempted to think that your shoes are the stinkiest and dirtiest thing that will go in your suitcase, and thus, there’s no point in separating your shoes and your laundry—but you’d be sorely incorrect. Your stinky laundry can actually make your shoes, especially canvas shoes, even smellier.
“I also no longer mix my dirty laundry with my shoe bags, and keep them separate,” Hamilton said. “I noticed that, especially with shoes like canvas sneakers, they would start to absorb odors from the dirty laundry.”
Put your shoes in their own bag, not only to keep the dirt and grime from your shoes from touching everything else in your suitcase, but to protect your shoes from any of the particularly powerful scents coming from your travel-worn underwear.
Bring some dryer sheets
“Lastly, throw a dryer sheet into your dirty laundry cube,” Hamilton said. You might not use a lot of dryer sheets in your normal laundry routine, but pack a few to keep your suitcase from permanently absorbing the scent of every adventure. You can put them in your suitcase and also in the packing cube with your dirty laundry.
“It's your last line of defense from odors seeping into the rest of your suitcase, especially for longer trips,” Hamilton added. “They take up no room at all.”
Then, when you get home, you can take out the dirty laundry and hopefully not be totally assaulted by five days worth of sweaty adventures. Just how long you wait to unpack your suitcase is up to you.
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