Just look at that action!
Ever Wonder How Commercial Laundries Deal With Flatwork?
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My brother and I used to watch the women who did the pressing when our parents took us to drop off and pick up cleaning because it was big machinery. You had a choice of getting shirts on hangers or folded in a wrapper and, for a while in those days before Perma Press, daddy's dress shirts were sent out. The inflatable forms on which shirts were ironed were fascinating, but we loved to watch the women who did the flatwork. The machines back then delivered the pressed flat pieces in a beautiul, loose back and forth cascade of fabric just below where it was fed in on the belts that carried it through the ironer. Their coreographed motions as they folded the large pieces inspired a lot of body slams and general rough housing when we had to fold bedding.
The ironer in this video looks like it would produce very sore shoulders for those feeding the flat work at such a steep upward angle, probably resulting in repetitive stress injuries.
The ironer in this video looks like it would produce very sore shoulders for those feeding the flat work at such a steep upward angle, probably resulting in repetitive stress injuries.
Accordion Folded Linens
Go way back, even to the days of hand ironing flatwork.
Not only are table cloths and sheets easier to open and spread out when folded in this manner, they also lack center and or more folds/creases. Something very important for some places such as hotel dining rooms, and certain homes that prefer table cloths without center or any other crease.
Ironing flatwork this way either takes a large table (by hand) or an ironer with a roller wide enough to do flatwork without it being folded. Miele and perhaps a few others used to sell uber sized rotary ironers for home use in Germany, Europe and other parts of the world, not sure if they still do today.
Go way back, even to the days of hand ironing flatwork.
Not only are table cloths and sheets easier to open and spread out when folded in this manner, they also lack center and or more folds/creases. Something very important for some places such as hotel dining rooms, and certain homes that prefer table cloths without center or any other crease.
Ironing flatwork this way either takes a large table (by hand) or an ironer with a roller wide enough to do flatwork without it being folded. Miele and perhaps a few others used to sell uber sized rotary ironers for home use in Germany, Europe and other parts of the world, not sure if they still do today.
We never had an ironing table, but I remember large amounts of brown kraft paper covering the floor under the ironing board, with plastic over that on the damp side, when the Belgian linen and Bruges lace table cloth was ironed very damp so it would have a beautiful finish. I need to figure out what to do with it.
bugsyjones
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The hotel I work for has a big ironer like that, but it's not as fancy. No touchpad controls and it doesn't auto-fold the napkins or auto-count them. Those have to be folded and counted by hand. It does auto-fold the table cloths and sheets and spits them out the side. You can hear the machine spraying starch as the linens go through. The only downside with table linens is that sometimes when it folds the half-way crease, the cloth gets bunched up and it ends up pressing some ugly wrinkles in the middle of the cloth.
Our property is small, so the ironer we have, although a bit old, works fine for what we need it for. This state-of-the-art machine is obviously for a large operation.
~Tim J.
Our property is small, so the ironer we have, although a bit old, works fine for what we need it for. This state-of-the-art machine is obviously for a large operation.
~Tim J.
Ah, yes - the crease down the middle of the tablecloth - always hate that. When I iron the tablecloths because of the size I do fold them in half, but when done I open it up and press out the center crease. When In a hurry I've been known to press out the line on the table itself- with protective pads on the table of course...
Once again an interesting and informative post by Launderess!
Once again an interesting and informative post by Launderess!
In The Very Best Households
Some of which still exsist either linen maids or someone else will iron a table cloth before it is placed on the table from the cupboard, including right on the table if necessary to remove any creases from storage and or the laundry.
The mandate about no center crease on table cloths is actually rather new thinking. In old France and elsewhere in Europe linen table cloths were folded into wonderful and beautiful ways that made a pattern after the cloth was placed on table. Squares or shimmering folds like waves were very popular. Napkins were also folded into a bizarre array of shapes. Swans, sea creatures, birds, the lot.
The later fell out of favour for one reason because some felt all the handling of a napkin to fold it into those shapes was too much handling of clean linen. I mean you never know where those hands had been! *LOL* To this end even today some better class of hotels have trained the staff to fold napkins whilst wearing gloves.
Back to folding/ironing table clothes with creases:
For much of recorded history of their existence table linen was made from just that, pure linen. Anyone whom has tried to iron a large table cloth knows it is nearly impossible to keep pure linen once freshed ironed from creasing as it's moved about the ironing board/table and or folded to be put away. Thus housewives and laundry-workers simply ironed the creases in to give a better finished product. Also large closets to store table cloths either unfolded (on rollers or hung) or with minimal folds such as accordion pleats are a new thing to household design (considering how long the things have been in use), and even today not everyone has that kind of room. All my vintage French laundry manuals give extensive directions on how to iron and fold table cloths into compact squares or rectangles. All the better then for fitting into a chest, shelf of a linen cupboard,linen press/armoire or dresser drawer. To this day there are still some laundries or laundresses who will fold table cloths to the exact size/shape to fit where the household will store them.
The only mandate about creases in formal table linen (and bed linen for that matter) is that the monogram (if there is one), is never ever creased through. Again my laundry manuals give exact instructions on how to iron and fold all sorts of flatwork that have a monogram so this will not happen. This applies to monograms only, not laundry marks.
What one found interesting about the folder in the OP is it produces napkins in the traditional "European" or "French" fashion of the things being folded into three to form a "carre" or square.
Some of which still exsist either linen maids or someone else will iron a table cloth before it is placed on the table from the cupboard, including right on the table if necessary to remove any creases from storage and or the laundry.
The mandate about no center crease on table cloths is actually rather new thinking. In old France and elsewhere in Europe linen table cloths were folded into wonderful and beautiful ways that made a pattern after the cloth was placed on table. Squares or shimmering folds like waves were very popular. Napkins were also folded into a bizarre array of shapes. Swans, sea creatures, birds, the lot.
The later fell out of favour for one reason because some felt all the handling of a napkin to fold it into those shapes was too much handling of clean linen. I mean you never know where those hands had been! *LOL* To this end even today some better class of hotels have trained the staff to fold napkins whilst wearing gloves.
Back to folding/ironing table clothes with creases:
For much of recorded history of their existence table linen was made from just that, pure linen. Anyone whom has tried to iron a large table cloth knows it is nearly impossible to keep pure linen once freshed ironed from creasing as it's moved about the ironing board/table and or folded to be put away. Thus housewives and laundry-workers simply ironed the creases in to give a better finished product. Also large closets to store table cloths either unfolded (on rollers or hung) or with minimal folds such as accordion pleats are a new thing to household design (considering how long the things have been in use), and even today not everyone has that kind of room. All my vintage French laundry manuals give extensive directions on how to iron and fold table cloths into compact squares or rectangles. All the better then for fitting into a chest, shelf of a linen cupboard,linen press/armoire or dresser drawer. To this day there are still some laundries or laundresses who will fold table cloths to the exact size/shape to fit where the household will store them.
The only mandate about creases in formal table linen (and bed linen for that matter) is that the monogram (if there is one), is never ever creased through. Again my laundry manuals give exact instructions on how to iron and fold all sorts of flatwork that have a monogram so this will not happen. This applies to monograms only, not laundry marks.
What one found interesting about the folder in the OP is it produces napkins in the traditional "European" or "French" fashion of the things being folded into three to form a "carre" or square.
On The Other Side Of The European Ironing/Laundry World
There is Marie Lavande, a "French Hand Laundry" that only does fine and heirloom linens.
P.S.
If you have to ask how much her services cost...... *LOL*
There is Marie Lavande, a "French Hand Laundry" that only does fine and heirloom linens.
P.S.
If you have to ask how much her services cost...... *LOL*
michaelman2
Well-known member
Laundress, this video was great, thank you for posting this. Very interesting.
Really intreging peice of equipment!From watching-the marks on the infeed belt appear to be "sticky" so they grab the item to be fed into the presser.The folder is pretty neat(As they say on the "Mangler"-"It folded her like a sheet!"Like the guards around it so that doesn't happen.and how the device can press and fold several small peices at once!NICE!!And for some odd reason that device reminds me of a surface planer or sander for woodworking-but no folder!
Those Laundry Workers
Shown in the OP.
Many of use muse how much "fun" it must be to work in a commercial laundry, when the truth is anything but.
Those poor women/workers have quotas to meet in terms of through-put. After that one huge cart is done more is still waiting fresh from the washers. There could be one, two, three or more waiting off the video's view for all we know. Can you imagine standing at that ironer for 8 hours per day reaching and stretching whilst feeding the beast? One only hopes workers are rotated to prevent strain.
In addition to feeding items into the ironer the workers have to do so in ways that do not drag larger items of flatwork/cause smaller ones to fall on to the dirty floor. If something becomes soiled it *should* go back to the wash. However if it's not caught and or someone tries to pull a fast one the dirt will be ironed onto the thing, folded and sent back to the customer.
Granted this particular laundry looks streets cleaner than many commercial one's I've seen around the NYC area. It also looks like the workers aren't harried,but then again this could have been a puff/marketing piece.
Before automatic folders there would have to be one or more persons at the other end of ironers to take the flatwork/items out. Some would fold as well, other laundries would simply have those workers stack items onto a table where other workers did the folding. Either way an automatic folder can whip out items faster than even the best workers at hand folding.
L.
Shown in the OP.
Many of use muse how much "fun" it must be to work in a commercial laundry, when the truth is anything but.
Those poor women/workers have quotas to meet in terms of through-put. After that one huge cart is done more is still waiting fresh from the washers. There could be one, two, three or more waiting off the video's view for all we know. Can you imagine standing at that ironer for 8 hours per day reaching and stretching whilst feeding the beast? One only hopes workers are rotated to prevent strain.
In addition to feeding items into the ironer the workers have to do so in ways that do not drag larger items of flatwork/cause smaller ones to fall on to the dirty floor. If something becomes soiled it *should* go back to the wash. However if it's not caught and or someone tries to pull a fast one the dirt will be ironed onto the thing, folded and sent back to the customer.
Granted this particular laundry looks streets cleaner than many commercial one's I've seen around the NYC area. It also looks like the workers aren't harried,but then again this could have been a puff/marketing piece.
Before automatic folders there would have to be one or more persons at the other end of ironers to take the flatwork/items out. Some would fold as well, other laundries would simply have those workers stack items onto a table where other workers did the folding. Either way an automatic folder can whip out items faster than even the best workers at hand folding.
L.
Yes,would assume work in an industrial laundry plant would be tough,hard,hot work.Like driving a bulldozer all day would be tough,hard work.Its just that the presser and the bullozer(I like heavy equipment,too)are interesting peices of equipment.Many times at my workplace transmitter work can be hard,hot,and dangerous.HV parts and moving parts-and yes some parts are hot.-even after the transmitter is off-and capacitors can store a dangerous electric charge.Gotta use the ground stick there!ALL types of work can be both dangerous and interesting.
Hot, Hard Work
I'm here to confirm that. The summer I graduated from high school I worked in a hospital as a summer replacement in housekeeping. Our supervisor's office was just before the entry to the laundry. Her office was air conditioned; the laundry was not. Toward the end of the summer, something happened in the laundry to cause them to fall way behind so 3 or 4 of us guys who were summer replacements were asked to put in 2 hour shifts in the laundry. We changed into some type of scrubs and gloves and loaded dirty linen from the room where it fell from the chute into tubs and pushed it to the laundry and then loaded it into the cascade double wide. It was a hot place, but they had big fans to keep a breeze going. Of course, I was like a pig in cool mud with all of that machinery and people who would answer questions about the operation. Across the front of the washer was a trough where the doors closed in the down position. When the cylinder took off clockwise or toward the back, an inch or so of water would surge up along the base of the doors. At the end of our rotation, which came all too soon for me, we had to shower with Phisohex. I still wound up getting a staph infection and had to go to the doctor for some topical oinkment.
It could not be classified as anything but hard, hot, dirty work, but the floors were kept very clean, especially between the washer and the extractor where we mopped after each unloading of dripping wet wash into the two halves of the extractor basket. I never quite understood how anything could be strong enough to hold those two halves together while spinning.
There was a large canopy over the ironer to carry off a lot of the heat and there was a lot of heat because the hotter it was, the faster the speed at which it could be operated and still turn out dry linen. Like the dryers, it was heated with steam coils, but one weekend when the laundry was down, the hospital electricians put in a bar of heat lamps to provide more heat so it could be speeded up.
In one of the historic pictures Mac shared with us, there was a woman folding all by herself. That must have been in one of the laundries Laundress wrote about where the flatwork out of the ironer was stacked up for folding later.
I'm here to confirm that. The summer I graduated from high school I worked in a hospital as a summer replacement in housekeeping. Our supervisor's office was just before the entry to the laundry. Her office was air conditioned; the laundry was not. Toward the end of the summer, something happened in the laundry to cause them to fall way behind so 3 or 4 of us guys who were summer replacements were asked to put in 2 hour shifts in the laundry. We changed into some type of scrubs and gloves and loaded dirty linen from the room where it fell from the chute into tubs and pushed it to the laundry and then loaded it into the cascade double wide. It was a hot place, but they had big fans to keep a breeze going. Of course, I was like a pig in cool mud with all of that machinery and people who would answer questions about the operation. Across the front of the washer was a trough where the doors closed in the down position. When the cylinder took off clockwise or toward the back, an inch or so of water would surge up along the base of the doors. At the end of our rotation, which came all too soon for me, we had to shower with Phisohex. I still wound up getting a staph infection and had to go to the doctor for some topical oinkment.
It could not be classified as anything but hard, hot, dirty work, but the floors were kept very clean, especially between the washer and the extractor where we mopped after each unloading of dripping wet wash into the two halves of the extractor basket. I never quite understood how anything could be strong enough to hold those two halves together while spinning.
There was a large canopy over the ironer to carry off a lot of the heat and there was a lot of heat because the hotter it was, the faster the speed at which it could be operated and still turn out dry linen. Like the dryers, it was heated with steam coils, but one weekend when the laundry was down, the hospital electricians put in a bar of heat lamps to provide more heat so it could be speeded up.
In one of the historic pictures Mac shared with us, there was a woman folding all by herself. That must have been in one of the laundries Laundress wrote about where the flatwork out of the ironer was stacked up for folding later.
THanks Laundress
Those Videos are cool, Love Marie Lavande's !
Puts my lovely Ironrite to shame!
Those Videos are cool, Love Marie Lavande's !
Puts my lovely Ironrite to shame!
Automatic Folding Machines
Allowed commercial laundries to increase their through-put dramatically. Machines can fold more flatwork per hour than humans ever can or could. The results are also more sanitary as fewer hands are touching freshly laundered linen and chances of larger items such as sheets and table cloths being dragged across the floor is removed.
OTOH using machinery for ironing and folding increases the potential for damage to the linen, and it does happen. Things can get caught, jammed, badly aligned and so forth. Using machines also puts certain requirements on what is fed into them, or at least how.
Polyester/cotton blend linens are easier to iron than cotton. Cotton easier to iron than linen. Each fabric will require different temperatures, residual moisture (dampness), and so forth that controls how fast it can pass through the ironers. This is one reason some laundries and or linen services lay down the law and insist on poly/cotton blends.
Unlike a domestic machine, large commercial ironers are set up to run batches after batches,and while temps and other parameters changed (usually already set up as programs), all irons/ironers tend to cool down faster than they heat. So if starting with high temperatures say for very wet pure linen or heavy cotton, it may take some time before things are cool enough to do man made fibers or blends. Of course this can be solved by items coming from the wash in proper order, but that would place demands elsewhere.
Use of commercial ironers and folding machines generally also precludes taking in fine/embroidered/trimed flatwork unless the place offers hand ironing as well. Plain monograms such as what one sees on hotel sheets or restaurant table linens are usually fine if they are loaded properly into the machines. But anything with elaborate designs such as lace, fringe, openwork, etc just isn't going to happen.
The last bit is one of the reasons many large establisments who send out their laundry stopped using fine flatwork. The cost of hand laundering (if you could find a place that does it)is dear, and the automated places were almost sure to send things back damaged sooner or later.
Allowed commercial laundries to increase their through-put dramatically. Machines can fold more flatwork per hour than humans ever can or could. The results are also more sanitary as fewer hands are touching freshly laundered linen and chances of larger items such as sheets and table cloths being dragged across the floor is removed.
OTOH using machinery for ironing and folding increases the potential for damage to the linen, and it does happen. Things can get caught, jammed, badly aligned and so forth. Using machines also puts certain requirements on what is fed into them, or at least how.
Polyester/cotton blend linens are easier to iron than cotton. Cotton easier to iron than linen. Each fabric will require different temperatures, residual moisture (dampness), and so forth that controls how fast it can pass through the ironers. This is one reason some laundries and or linen services lay down the law and insist on poly/cotton blends.
Unlike a domestic machine, large commercial ironers are set up to run batches after batches,and while temps and other parameters changed (usually already set up as programs), all irons/ironers tend to cool down faster than they heat. So if starting with high temperatures say for very wet pure linen or heavy cotton, it may take some time before things are cool enough to do man made fibers or blends. Of course this can be solved by items coming from the wash in proper order, but that would place demands elsewhere.
Use of commercial ironers and folding machines generally also precludes taking in fine/embroidered/trimed flatwork unless the place offers hand ironing as well. Plain monograms such as what one sees on hotel sheets or restaurant table linens are usually fine if they are loaded properly into the machines. But anything with elaborate designs such as lace, fringe, openwork, etc just isn't going to happen.
The last bit is one of the reasons many large establisments who send out their laundry stopped using fine flatwork. The cost of hand laundering (if you could find a place that does it)is dear, and the automated places were almost sure to send things back damaged sooner or later.
There are other flatwork machines that need only one person to run. There are 2 clips on wires where ONE worker clips the opposite corners, starts the machine and the 2 clips stretch the fabric taut and feed it flat onto the rollers. A lot of fun to watch...
Yeppers
There are also ironers that will return flatwork to the front which in theory can be used by single operators. However in general once you start going with roller widths >36" or so it requires two persons to gather up the freshed ironed (and often quite hot) linen. Also front return probably slows down through-put since the same operator/operators feed in, remove then place the linen somewhere.
When using ironers without folders often the laundry or whatever has a large table behind the unit. Two persons, one taking each side will "pull" the linen out of the ironer and guide it towards the table. There it will remain to cool and wait for folding. With a small staff all the ironing maybe done first, allowed to cool then everyone starts folding.
There are manual sheet folding contraptions that bolt onto a wall/floor which in theory allow one person to fold flatwork. Used by hotels and others it supposedly gives better results than other methods.
One basically clamps one end of the linen (folded in half), and begins a series of movements that folds the sheet. In reality the "machine" acts like another person and thus replicates the movements of two people folding.
There are also ironers that will return flatwork to the front which in theory can be used by single operators. However in general once you start going with roller widths >36" or so it requires two persons to gather up the freshed ironed (and often quite hot) linen. Also front return probably slows down through-put since the same operator/operators feed in, remove then place the linen somewhere.
When using ironers without folders often the laundry or whatever has a large table behind the unit. Two persons, one taking each side will "pull" the linen out of the ironer and guide it towards the table. There it will remain to cool and wait for folding. With a small staff all the ironing maybe done first, allowed to cool then everyone starts folding.
There are manual sheet folding contraptions that bolt onto a wall/floor which in theory allow one person to fold flatwork. Used by hotels and others it supposedly gives better results than other methods.
One basically clamps one end of the linen (folded in half), and begins a series of movements that folds the sheet. In reality the "machine" acts like another person and thus replicates the movements of two people folding.
Oh Yes
we had a Foldmaster 9000 at work for awhile, we could fold embroidered shirts nato fast! But it was plastic and after the umpteenth fold it split and gave up the ghost.
we had a Foldmaster 9000 at work for awhile, we could fold embroidered shirts nato fast! But it was plastic and after the umpteenth fold it split and gave up the ghost.
