Get the Comforters Done Before the Holiday Guests Arrive
Every year the same thing happens. Guests are coming, someone opens the spare room, and the bedding smells of closet.
It is entirely predictable and entirely avoidable, and the only real trick is doing it two weeks earlier than feels necessary.
Why guest bedding is the worst bedding in the house
It is used rarely and stored constantly, which in this climate is the problem rather than the solution.
Bedding that sits folded in a closet for eleven months absorbs ambient humidity, and without air movement that becomes the musty smell everyone recognises. It was clean when it went in. That is not the issue.
Guest rooms also tend to be the rooms furthest from the air conditioning, with the door kept shut, which is precisely the stagnant warm condition that causes it.
The checklist
- Comforters and duvets for every guest bed
- Mattress pads and protectors, which almost nobody thinks about
- Pillows themselves, not just the cases
- Blankets and throws, including the decorative ones nobody washes
- Bed skirts and decorative shams
- Guest towels, particularly any stored in a closed cupboard
- Curtains in the guest room if it has been more than a couple of years
Pillows are the one to underline. People wash pillowcases weekly for years and never once clean the pillow inside them.
Timing, realistically
Start two to three weeks ahead. Not because the cleaning takes that long, but because of what you find when you open the closet. Something will have a stain nobody remembers, or a pillow will turn out to be past saving and need replacing, and you want time for that.
Comforters need a few days because drying properly is the slow part and rushing it is exactly how fill gets ruined. That is not padding the estimate, it is the process.
The week before
Make the beds a few days early rather than the night before, and leave the room door open with air moving through it. Freshly cleaned bedding in a closed unused room can pick the smell back up surprisingly quickly here.
A small thing that works: put the cleaned bedding straight onto the beds rather than back into the closet.
Everything goes in one collection
Comforters, pillows, blankets, mattress pads, towels and curtains can all be collected together and come back sorted. Free pickup and delivery, which for bulky bedding is the entire point.
Book ahead
Call 954 983 7519 or request a free pickup. The weeks before major holidays are our busiest, so booking early genuinely helps. See our bedding page.
La Mar 1 Hour Dry Cleaners, 6430 Pembroke Rd, Miramar, FL 33023. Family run since 1962.