The quest to make the best Eco Towels

I first thought about making eco towels when I purchased some dinner napkins that were made from a pattern I liked so much i just couldn’t stop using them. I noticed the more we used these the less we used paper towels at dinner. Then I noticed how much more I could cut back on paper consumption if I just used some rags I had fashioned from old towels. Then I started thinking these rags were not the prettiest tine to have around why couldn’t I have the best of both worlds. I could combine the nice cotton prints I like with a backing that is more suitable for absorption and cleaning. So I began my quest to make a really great reusable and machine washable eco towels.

I live in a house that is all males (even the cat and dog) so things tend to get messy. Get messy, who am I kidding? Things tend to stay messy. I feel like every two minutes I’m wiping up apple juice or cleaning the spilled coffee. I began experimenting with fabrics, sizes, interfacing, and even my snap placement. In fact when you look at my huge roll of eco towels almost no two are alike. In the spirit of being eco I still use the ones that really weren’t up to par. Luckily for those of you purchasing some I have worked out all the kinks. Like any good product I beta tested until all of my materials were right.

I settled on a 100% cotton eco towel with a cotton print on one side and an organic unbleached terry cloth on the other. I have found that 3 snaps is just right and these really work best on a horizontal paper towel holder. There are tons of great options out there from the kind you mount under your cabinet to a counter top model. I made rack out of galvanized steel pipe from the hardware store and I love the industrial look of it in our kitchen. But what I love even more is that I only purchase one roll of paper towels every other month that I now keep under the sink as it is just for those emergency type of messes. An I will stop there before I elaborate any further on those.