Last month, Spacing photography intern Christine Mullen spent numerous mornings wandering in and out of the city’s laundromats. These semi-public-private spaces are unique for a few reasons: usually, no one works on location so people are free to come and go as they please; the locations act as a local gathering spot and offer a social experience much like a coffee shop or café; anyone can enter and use the fascilities unlike most commercial properties.
Check out Christine’s photo essay on the re-vamped Spacing Photos blog.
8 comments
I’m surprised to see top -load washers still in use.
Don’t the owners of these places realize the efficiency of front-loads?
Worse–doesn’t a government either federal or provincial offer some energy-conservation incentive for these owners to make the switch?
My apartment building now has three front-loads and 5 top-loads. Guess which ones get the most use?
All of us know the economies of front-loads and we’re waiting for Toronto Housing to complete the conversion.
Also front load is nicer to your clothes. No angry agitator in the middle.
The owners of the laundromat I use are always there when it is open. They offer service washes (by weight)too. They are always happy to make change. We do not share the same taste in television but they do provide a range of newspapers – the freebies to be sure and anything that gets left behind. Social centre? I don’t think so. People do talk but there is a coffee place just around the corner so there are nicer places to spend 20 minutes where you do not have to listen to “Wheel of Fortune”. But the machines are always clean and functioning, and I have never had to wait for a dryer. I will miss it when I move to my new place with my own w/d
After walking by the laundromat in Jane Park Plaza (at Jane & Alliance) at least once a week from spring to fall last year, I came to the conclusion that the City should start delivering and promoting its services in laundromats.
The people who generally use the laundromat are tenants and tenants with lower incomes (you can see people walking from the surrounding high rises with their carts), and often there are children who are around the laundromat during the day (on weekends). These are key populations that tend to need City services (particularly soft/social services) most and have the least access. And I’m sure that for a small sum, any laundromat owner would be thrilled to make their business even more welcoming to existing and potential customers.
Laundromats are good places to leave the magazines you don’t want anymore either. Some magazines, that is. Some, I’m sure, you’d want to keep like a book.
Amusingly, some people who advocate the energy-efficiency of front-loading washers are also sometimes people who cling to the monstrously consumptive but convenient! dryer.
I can understand that people who need laundromats probably can’t take their clothes home to dry, but please, if you’ve got the space and the ability, buy a nice, cheap clothes rack or clothesline, and ditch your dryer.
Doing your laundry a day ahead or so is not hard, and your clothes will last longer too.
People who use a laundromat in Toronto should write to their Member of Parliament and tell them NOT to harmonize the GST/PST when it comes to laundromats!!!
The laundromat owners will have no choice but to raise prices as they will have to start submitting an additional 8% tax based on their revenues. This will lead to higher prices in the laundromat and no one wants that!
Write to your politician today!!!
Laundromats can have bed bugs in them… ask me how I know?!
There’s a great laundry service in Toronto that gets rid of them though called bugs r gone laundry.
If you need it, it’s nice to know it’s there!