Flat sheet versus contour sheet

[sudsman]

Fitted Sheets from the Laundry Managers view

I process some 200 fitted sheets each day,And have ALWAYS HATED them. The Ironer must be run at half speed or less and the folder must be bypassed as they cannot be messured properly for automatic folding. It takes 5 people to run fitted sheets. 2 feeding the ironer and 3 folders. Two folding length wise as they come off a 375 degree ironer and 1 making the final 3 crossfolds. We can run 400 to 500 flat sheets with only 3 people in the time it takes to run only 200 fitted.

Fitted sheets DO NOT last as long as flat sheets as the elastic cannot withstand ironing temperatures and the detergents normally used in hospital or hotel laundring. on the avg. A flat sheets last thru 200 washings a fitted sheet will last approx. 75 to 80 washings. This is also not to mention the fact that too many times they are litterly "ripped " off the beds by housekeeping. Then we have the extra repair cost to add in also. We have several Drs. that have stock in 2 VERY upscale hotels here. And we have to process work for both of them also.. One uses fitted sheets the other does not. Both charge in excess of $500.00 per night. I assure you the cost of a room has NOTHING to do with the use of fitted sheets..

In 30+ years I have NEVER talked with any laundry manager that likes fitted sheets. We have to process what is purchased or wanted by others.

Most of the time the use of them is dictated by Housekeepers who are pushed into trying to produce more work faster, or see how many more beds can be made useing fitted sheets than use of flat sheets.

We still have a few that know how to make a hospital bed but too many times they do not want to take the extra few seconds it takes to do the job right. We also have one facility that knots the sheets at both ends making sure they will not come off the beds.

In the past years most fitted sheets would fit any bed. no so any more as mattress thickness are now VERY different. Now they range anywhere from 3 to 4" all the way to 9 or 10 " no one sheet will fit all anymore. Even in hospitals the thickness varies greatly.. This is also another point for flat sheets. as the thickness does not matter as much.

 

[launderess]

Well We All Can Claim A Bit of Glory

All points represented here:

http://64.233.169.104/search?q=cach...itted+sheets+hotels&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=49&gl=us

 

[bajaespuma]

two cents:

seems to me that the whether or not one uses a contour sheet and how they deal with that contour sheet could be an excellent test for OCD(Martha Stewart, for example).

Although I found that folding video informative, I've been folding contour sheets, after a fashion, successfully for years and although a bit of a pain, not a problem.

I always agree with Laundress, but we had a friend who was a surgical nurse at St. Vincent's during the sixties and she used to describe what those sadistic nuns and doctors used to make those poor overworked women go through, for no really good reason other than collective insanity and vanity. For one thing, Jill used to have to wear a standard nurses' uniform modeled on the nuns' habits that included wimples and straight pins. Nurses had to sleep in these things as it took more than twenty minutes for them to get properly attired for the operating theatre when on call. In that environment, a perfectly mitred hospital corner(which, by the way, I pride myself on being able to achieve having been taught by another woman who was also a practical nurse at Bellevue) would have been the least of their tasks. Thank God times have changed. Can you imagine requiring the work pool hospitals need to draw from today even making a bed properly? Although I miss many of the customs and products of yesteryear, many inventions, like the contour sheet and the automatic washer, deserve gratitude for freeing people(mostly women) from pointless drudgery.

Long live contour sheets.

 

[westtexman]

And Now For The Million Dollar Question . . .

Launderess -

I remember you saying a while back that you change your sheets several times per week. With that in mind, which ones do you use/prefer on a daily basis - flat or fitted?

I can only imagine that your house is very similar to a luxary hotel in many ways - freshly ironed linens, soft yet absorbent white towels and nicely starched table cloths and napkins! As a single guy here and somewhat of a workaholic, I'm lucky to have time to make my bed, much less iron my sheets - though I love the idea!

 

[launderess]

All of my bed linen is vintage linen, Metis (a French sheeting of cotton and linen blend), percale and muslin. The excpetion are two fited sheets that came with a set (Frette and Nancy Koltes), given as gifts

 

[danemodsandy]

I Only Wish...

...That Cannon was still around as an American mill. They made a great 200-count percale at a very reasonable price. I'm not really a fan of high-count percale; the cost is disproportionate to the benefit, in my personal scheme of things. I tend to like no-frills stuff.

I was once lodged in a guest room that had high-count sheets and cases edged with Battenberg lace. Now there was a case of Kreuger Face....

 

[launderess]

Have some vintage Cannon things: mainly towels, washcloths and some sheets (percale). Wamsutta's "supercale" and Cannon's "Lavender Lawn" and others probably were the best cotton bed linens ever made in the United States, or any place else for that matter. Vintage Wamsutta and Cannon percale linens go for big money on eBay, thankfully one has a stash large enough for the duration, and knows how to find more.

The only problem with vintage percale sheets is finding sizes larger than 108"x81". Often 108"x91" comes up, but they are rare as large queen sized beds, nor king were common in Amercian homes until after the heyday of pure cotton linens. By the time Cannon started producing "Lustercale" (a poly cotton blend), around the 1960's or so, housewives had started getting out of the habit of ironing, especially sheets.

IMHO, NOTHING equals sleeping on freshly washed, line dried then damp ironed linens. Not even commercial laundry where linens are ironed damp on an ironer right from the washing machine.

L.

 

[danemodsandy]

Launderess:

"Have some vintage Cannon things: mainly towels, washcloths and some sheets (percale). Wamsutta's "supercale" and Cannon's "Lavender Lawn" and others probably were the best cotton bed linens ever made in the United States, or any place else for that matter."

Oh, for the days when real quality was as close as your nearest major department store, or the pages of the Sears, Penneys, and Monkey Wards catalogues....

 

[whirlcool]

I remember the days when you could purchase a flat sheet of a fitted sheet as separates. Nowadays it seems everything comes in "sets".
We have a set of 300 TC Egyptian Cotton sheets by Springmaid we about about 10 years ago. Those are the softest sheets we have ever felt. We paid a good penny for the set, bought them as separates. And they are wearing like iron! About a year ago we went looking for them again and the store we bought them at no longer carries the brand. One of our neighbors told Karen that you can now find Springmaid sheets at Walmart. I am sure it's another case of the name being sold off and cheap products being sold under that name.
I definitely remember Cannon's Made In USA campaign. It seems that all the manufacturing of sheets has also gone overseas mostly to India and Pakistan. I guess at some point in time there was consolidation in the linen industry here in the US?

 

[jamiel]

I worked at a department store's linen department (L.S. Ayres in Cincinnati...they had taken over Pogue's which was the carriage trade store there) 22 years ago...amazing how pricing has declined since then...don't ask why I remember but our brand was Wamsutta...I still recall that the pricing for our basics was 5.99/9.99/14.99/19.99 TFQK for 180 count blended percale, 9.99 twin for Supercale 200 TC blended and 14.99 for Ultracale 250 TC 100% cotton. I continue to be amazed at how much cheaper linens are now (notwithstanding the quality differences...)

 

[bajaespuma]

Sometimes an accident is a woman's best friend...

Laundress,

Is your real name Vera Donovan???? (SIX PINS, Dolores, you know I want six pins!!)

 

[launderess]

Short History of Linen/Textile Manufacturing In The United S

At one time, the Northeast states(Conn,MA, NY, etc) did much of the textile manufacturing. Cotton would be shipped from the South to be spun into threads, woven into cloth, etc. Indeed the "Pequot" brand of linens comes from the name of a town, which in turn took it's name from a tribe of Indians which inhabited an area of MA.

With time many plants moved down to the South, to take advantage of cheap labour. All over Conn and MA for instance you can find abandoned mills and textile plants. The South remained strong until around the 1980's and 1990's when production began to shift to Asia, again because of cheap production costs.

One by one the great names either merged or moved production out of the United States, but still have product shipped back for sale. Pillowtex, Martex, Cannon, Dan River, Fieldcrest, and so forth have all either merged, or went bankrupt (Pillowtex), and or have production overseas.

One of the reasons the South has had such a hard economic times for awhile was the loss of so much textile and mill work. Sewing, running weaving and spinning machines, and the rest of what goes into making all sorts of textils and garments is a skill, but one that can be learned and does not require a collge much less high school degree. The loss of those jobs has pretty much wrecked the economy of many small towns in the South and indeed some states.

For what is worth, Europe is now having the same problems, with even many high end Italian and French textile producers sending more and more work to Asia. Reason is simple, one simply cannot beat the low cost labour.

L.

 

[tolivac]

Southern textile industries-I have seen the effects-closed textile factories here in NC-many within a few miles of my home-Pillowtex among them.Fruit of the Loom another-a factory that made underwear and T-shirts.The Fruit-of the Loom factory has been torn down-at one time it was a flea market place.And of course you see the surplus textile equipment showing up around here in various places-mostly large sewing machines.I am not in the textile industry but have seen the effects-kinda miss that old factory that was in Grimesland-Used to pass by that factory on my way to work at one of the other transmitter sites-that transmitter site is now closed.And when I got off my mid shift-could see people coming to work at that factory.Now Grimesland is a much quieter place.And downtown Grimesland has many shuttered stores.I can't remember the name of the company offhand-a spinning outfit that made supplies for the textile factories out here-they are in Rocky Mount-still operating.I am sure their business is way down.There are still MANY older textile plant buildings in Kinston,Greenville that must have closed years and years ago-the buildings are run down.-weeds growing about them and even IN them.Also the tobacco industry out here has been cut back.Don't see near the tobacco crops I used to see.The county I live in was considered the largest tobacco producer in the US at one time.The tobacco was shipped to Richmond to be made into cigarettes.I don't know what some of these people do nowadays-and yes LOTS of homes for sale here.Some have been for sale over a year.Another one for textiles-DuPont-the Kinston Dacron producing plant has been cut back-they produce dacron and nylon fibers.they are on the same powerline as the transmitter site I work at.

 

[gansky1]

Great thread and lots of good information. Thanks for the quick history lesson on the American Textiles, L. I would love to see the bolt of french linen you spoke of - I'll bet it has a wonderful hand.

I have always used contour sheets, but learned to make a bed under the critical eye of my grandmother that never used contour sheets until much later in life when age and physical limitations prevented her from bending and stretching over the beds as she once had done. There was nothing nicer than getting into a bed made with line-dried and ironed cotton sheets!

I have had some terrible problems finding sheets, contour and flat, that actually fit the deeper mattresses and will stay on the bed. I have a set of RL sheets for the spare bed that were a major disappointment when new.

Tell me what to watch for at the estate sales, L, and I'll start checking out the mounds of linens at most every house!

 

[danemodsandy]

The Saddest Mill Town of All...

...May be Cliffside, North Carolina, which was home to a booming mill for a century. It began as a gingham mill, then switched to terry (it was referred to as "Towel Town" for years), then had a final three decades making denim.

What's sad about Cliffside is that it basically no longer exists. The owners of the mill, Cone Mills, closed and demolished all employee housing beginning in the '60s, then tore down all the town's public buildings, like its store buildings and Memorial Building, which housed recreation facilities and a movie theatre. Last year, the mill itself came down.

What remains in Cliffside is a couple of churches, the cemetery, and a few new buildings, houses, and businesses that people who grew up there have built. Cliffsiders have an enormous attachment to the place, even as badly as it and they have been treated; many of them are trying to return and rebuild it as a community. There is an incredible Website called "Remember Cliffside", built by former residents, giving the entire history of the place, with tons of archival photos, personal memories, and articles. I highly recommend it to anyone wanting to know more about this vanished way of American life. You will not be sorry you visited.

http://www.remembercliffside.com