FABRICCARELAB
Wash it right — fabric care, laundry science, and clothes that last.
From picking the right wash temperature and sizing a load to dosing detergent, timing the dryer, treating a stain, and predicting shrinkage before it happens, FabricCareLab pairs free hands-on laundry calculators with practical guides and a richly illustrated museum. Wash it right, every time.
Fabric Care Calculators
Free tools for every wash day — wash temperature guide, laundry load size calculator, detergent dosing calculator, drying time estimator, stain removal guide, and fabric shrinkage calculator.
Wash Temperature & Care Guide
Get the right wash temperature, cycle, and spin speed for any fabric — cotton, linen, wool, silk, polyester, nylon, acrylic, and spandex blends — adjusted for soil level and color protection
Laundry Load Size Calculator
Work out how much laundry to load for a normal, delicate, bulky, or heavily soiled wash — from your washer's rated capacity in kilograms or its drum volume in liters
Detergent Dosing Calculator
Get the right detergent dose based on load weight, water hardness, soil level, and whether your detergent is standard, concentrated, or ultra-concentrated
Drying Time Estimator
Estimate how long a load takes to dry by fabric, drying method and heat setting, and wash spin speed — tumble dryer or air-drying, in minutes and hours
Stain Removal Guide
Pick your stain and fabric for the right rinse temperature, pretreatment, and step-by-step method — protein, oil-based, tannin, dye/ink, wax/gum, and mud/dirt stains
Fabric Shrinkage Calculator
Predict how much a garment will shrink by fabric and drying method, or work backward from a target finished size to what you should buy or cut
Fabric & Laundry Museum
Wander an immersive museum of textiles and washday — the natural fibers grown by plants and animals alongside the synthetic fibers engineered to replace them, the tools and machines that turned washday from a riverbank chore into a push-button routine, and the small symbols sewn into every collar that quietly govern how we care for it all, each in its own gallery, so you can get to know the stories behind every fiber and machine: how it came to be, what makes it behave the way it does, and the role it plays in the clothes you wear.
Tour the museum →From the Journal
Fresh guides on washing basics, fabric types, detergents, drying and care, stain removal, and sorting and machine care, plus practical tips for making clothes last longer.
How to Read a Wash-Care Label: Every Symbol Explained
The five care-label icons — wash tub, triangle, square, circle, and iron — explain everything a garment needs. A plain-language key to what each one actually means.
Cold Wash vs Hot Wash: What Temperature Actually Does
Temperature isn't a single dial from 'gentle' to 'strong' — it changes what detergent can dissolve, what stains it sets versus lifts, and what happens to the fibers themselves.
Why Your Towels Are Going Stiff (and How to Fix It)
Stiff, less-absorbent towels are usually a detergent-residue and mineral-buildup problem, not a worn-out towel — and the fix has nothing to do with buying new ones.
The Right Amount of Detergent: Why More Isn't Cleaner
Overdosing detergent doesn't clean better — it leaves residue that stiffens fabric, dulls colour, and can irritate skin. Here's what actually determines the right dose.
Treating Stains Fast: The First 10 Minutes Matter Most
Whether a stain comes out completely or becomes a permanent mark is usually decided in the first few minutes after it happens — before it ever reaches the washing machine.
Washing Polyester, Nylon, and Acrylic Without Ruining Them
Synthetics don't shrink or felt the way natural fibers do, but they have their own failure modes — pilling, static, odor retention, and heat damage — that need a different approach.
Keep Learning
Plain-language explainers on fibers and fabrics, the machines and tools that clean them, and the care symbols and labels that tell you how — everything you need to dig deeper and get more life out of your clothes.
Visit the Learn hub →