Our site was created to talk about rotary lines, but it soon became clear to us that some of our readers would be more suited to other types of washing line.
In this section, we’re taking a closer look at some other types of line. The most common two reasons why rotary varieties aren’t suitable are a lack of sufficient outdoor space (perhaps you live in a flat without a garden, or it’s a shared outdoor space) or getting the (usually concrete mounted or ground spike) fixings into the ground just aren’t viable.
Whatever your reason for being unsure that a whirligig style line is right for your home, there’s an alternative here that will be a good alternative.
Contents
Clothes Airer
Mainly used indoors, clothes airers are a low cost solution for drying your laundry with the added bonus that they’re almost always foldable to put away for storage, making them portable so you can erect them anywhere as required.
We’ve chosen the Vileda 159127 washing line here as an example as it’s Amazon’s best seller at the time of writing in August 2020, but there are a huge number to choose from. You can learn more about clothes airers here, or see the current price for this model here:
Radiator Airers
If space is really tight, radiator airers allow you to dry a small amount on these clever devices that mount onto the radiators themselves. When you’ve got the heating on, that means drying performance improves, allowing the heat of the radiator to shorten the drying time.
Read more about radiator airers here, and see the current options available to you on Amazon.
This model is the Vileda Express 157334, offering great value with up to 3m of drying space across all bars. While you won’t get much clothing on it at the same time, you can mount one onto each radiator, making this great if you live in a flat with limited space but several radiators. Of course, they can be removed when not in use.
Retractable Washing Lines
The next two varieties are similar, with one important difference. The first is a retractable line which stretches between two points, usually across your garden.
The important feature here is that when it’s not in use it retracts back into its casing, usually with a spring-loaded mechanism to coil it back onto a reel in the housing of the case. That’s great if it’s in the way when secured across the garden – for example if you’ve got kids that love to charge around kicking a football.
Retractable lines are a little more expensive than non retractable alternatives (more on that in a second), but most people these days recognise the benefits and tidiness of being able to put them away when not in use.
The model shown is the Minky VT20500103 retractable reel washing line, which gives a total of 30m of drying space across two separate (and independently operable) retractable lines.
You can read more about retractable lines here, or check out the current price of the highly popular Minky model here:
Wall Mounted Fixed Lines
Finally, a variate on the retractable line are these wall mounted lines. The difference is they’re fixed, so consider them a permanent fixture in your garden once installed. Generally, if you’re going down this route, you’re probably looking for the cheapest possible solution, for example when you’re on a very small budget.
The line shown is the Trendy Homeware green 30m line, which is a cord that you can either use as a fixed line, or as a replacement on an existing rotary line.
You’ll typically just be buying a length of PVC (or similar) line, which you’ll need to tie at either end to some sort of fixing point at either end. For this reason, it’s not something we recommend, as you’re far more likely to need to replace it sooner.
However, if you’re sure this is the way you want to go, you can see more lines to buy here. Alternatively, you can see the price for the Trendy Homeware line here:
