[HN Gopher] Laundry symbols make no sense
___________________________________________________________________
Laundry symbols make no sense
Author : allenwhsu
Score : 212 points
Date : 2022-06-21 13:10 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (uxdesign.cc)
(TXT) w3m dump (uxdesign.cc)
| probably_wrong wrote:
| I wonder whether using a thermometer is a good idea. Mercury
| thermometers are getting harder to find, which is not great for a
| symbol expected to last 50 years.
|
| Then again, maybe we have another "floppy disk" situation where
| the concept survives the artifact.
| andrew_ wrote:
| I liked the case study, but I think what the author is missing is
| that the symbols in use today accommodate many different printing
| techniques across the garment and textile industries. If
| everything was done using sublimation, then sure, you could use
| more complex symbols. But that's not the case.
| Izkata wrote:
| Speaking of bad design, who thought it was a good idea to blink
| the labels in the animation, immediately after saying half of
| people asked knew _none_ of the symbols?
| p1mrx wrote:
| Here are the frames with text: https://imgur.com/a/cP52BPP
| philliphaydon wrote:
| Thanks for this. I thought I noticed an error and was able to
| see.
|
| The 70/60 degree temp icons both say 70 in the text below. :D
| Cd00d wrote:
| Agreed. I had to watch the animation cycle a dozen times to
| address my curiosity on what the current symbols mean. Should
| have been two images like below, but with the text.
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| Downvote and move on from low quality posts
| ARandomerDude wrote:
| naravara wrote:
| Also it seems like if the intent of the logos is to be easily
| looked up for reference, the real UX failure is in the washing
| machines rather than the tags. Why don't the machines just
| stamp a reference table by the control panel?
| [deleted]
| jedberg wrote:
| I have a chart with all the symbols printed out next to the
| laundry machine.
|
| In most cases it's pretty obvious how a fabric should be washed
| just based on the feel of the material. In cases where it isn't,
| I've got the chart up in the one place I do laundry. Most launder
| mats I've been to have the same chart on the wall somewhere.
|
| I'm not sure why memorizing is so bad in this case.
| kgermino wrote:
| Some of these are better (the bleach one being the most obvious)
| but most of them are worse or neutral. If I don't know what a
| line under the washing machine means, how am I supposed to know
| what the 2nd button means. The line is at least more visible.
|
| It's similar for the iron. Maybe dots as temperature isn't
| obvious, but it's about as clear as the thermometer, is easy to
| read, and matches the icons on the iron itself.
| bigtones wrote:
| The original dry-clean and do not dry-clean ones are the most
| confusing for me. A plain circle is somehow meant to represent
| dry-cleaning ?
| Izkata wrote:
| Compare to the other symbols in that set: a square refers to
| the drying process, with the contents being how to dry it. A
| circle instead of a square means no drying process, so it
| shouldn't get wet in the first place - hence dry-cleaning.
|
| At least that's how I see it, it could also just have been
| the last obvious symbol remaining after square/triangle were
| taken.
| bombcar wrote:
| Since dry-cleaning isn't "dry" (it still uses liquids, just
| not water) it should be a simple drop of water symbol with
| the universal "NO" bar across it like this:
| https://www.istockphoto.com/vector/blue-drop-or-droplet-
| of-w...
| jwilk wrote:
| How do you tell a drop of water apart from a drop non-
| water liquid?
| mook wrote:
| That makes "do not dry clean" difficult, since it'll
| effectively be a double negative.
|
| (I do think the circle is difficult, but that's probably
| because I don't typically wear clothes that one would
| think about dry cleaning)
| bombcar wrote:
| Then you'd just have a drop, but true, there are _three_
| states - dry clean ok, dry clean bad, dry clean mandatory
| (where the first is do either, but that could be
| indicated with no symbol at all).
| latortuga wrote:
| I think the dots / temp gauge should be combined here. 1 dot /
| 2 dots / 3 dots. The temperature gauge is hard to tell how
| full/empty it is which the dots help with, and single dots make
| it difficult to remember whether left or right means low or
| high.
| joosters wrote:
| I don't follow your single dots argument? There's no right or
| left, one dot = low? Plus, as the OP says, irons use the
| exact same dot count, so nothing else is needed.
| Schroedingersat wrote:
| The bleach one slightly reduces front loaded friction (ie.
| don't need to learn it) at the expense of being less legible,
| harder to print cleanly, less robust to fading and uglier. The
| others don't even really have the first benefit.
|
| Which is exactly in line with 'good' ui design in software. So
| goal achieved, I guess.
| nephrite wrote:
| I haven't used an iron for ages, but old irons used dots for
| temperature, so the old icon represents what you would see on
| an actual iron.
| fhars wrote:
| To me it looks like neither you nor the designer have ever used
| an iron on their clothes. Every iron I have ever seen had one,
| two and three dot markings at the appropriate positions on the
| temperature dial.
|
| Or does that just happen on European irons?
| plorkyeran wrote:
| My iron does not have a temperature dial (it has digital
| controls) and none of the settings have any dots or anything
| that resembles the tag icons in any way.
| kgermino wrote:
| No that happens here (US) too. That's what I was referring to
| when I said it "matches the icons on the iron itself" but
| it's not a very clear sentence.
| mrcartmeneses wrote:
| The dots on the iron are blatantly obvious for anyone that's
| used an iron or is about to use an iron because they are marked
| on the iron's temperature control. That's the beauty of
| standards. Similarly a lot of the symbols are marked on your
| washer or dryer
| kergonath wrote:
| > the bleach one being the most obvious
|
| It's really not. It looks like an Erlenmeyer flask, which could
| contain anything ("use detergent"? "Use additives"? There are
| lots of things that come up in bottles in my laundry room).
|
| I found the ones about drying to be better, probably because
| the original ones were way too abstract.
|
| > If I don't know what a line under the washing machine means,
| how am I supposed to know what the 2nd button means.
|
| Exactly! I don't know what pushing the 2nd button on my washing
| machine does, either. Hell, my washing machine does not have
| anything that looks like the buttons of the symbols. And good
| luck trying to guess which one of the three buttons is filled
| after 5 washes, when the presence of one or two lines will
| still be clear.
| Izkata wrote:
| The washing machines in my building have the buttons in a 2x2
| grid (the 4th being a "small load" toggle for reduced water
| usage), so it has no relation to anything here either.
| Melatonic wrote:
| Some aspects are improved - some are not. I cannot imageine the
| tiny tiny numbers inside the washing machine are going to print
| well. But the washing machine logo in general makes more sense?
| ajhurliman wrote:
| I don't understand the old symbols, and I don't understand these
| redesigned symbols either. Maybe they could just write it out?
| eddyg wrote:
| In the mean time, thank goodness for apps like Laundry Lens!
|
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/laundry-lens/id1513767864
| zcw100 wrote:
| " these symbols are designed to be memorized or looked up" ok so
| include it on the front of your washing machine and dryer.
|
| " stroke width was increased so the overall shapes can still be
| read when details are lost to the viewing distance or blurred
| visions"
|
| Increasing the stroke width isn't going to overcome this and the
| symbols have to be durable enough to still be read after the tag
| is worn and faded.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| It's a lost cause, looking for 'intuitive' symbols. It depends on
| your culture, your experiences, heck your generation. Just look
| at the symbols for 'save' (a floppy disk) or 'make a call' (an
| old phone handset). Kids just have to memorize them, they mean
| nothing 'intuitively'.
|
| I liken these attempts at symbol sets, to ancient hieroglyphics -
| a different picture-writing for everything. Even the Egyptians
| gave up and turned to phonetic spelling.
|
| Just write the instructions on the tag. Or heck, put a 2D scan
| code there and my phone will tell me what to do.
| detritus wrote:
| Within a second of seeing the 'improved' ones I spot what is, to
| my mind at least, an immediate failure - the detail resolution is
| far too small. It doesn't account for the printing limitations on
| small fabric tags, never mind the ability of old fogeys such as
| myself to be able to squint that hard and actually read them.
|
| I have no idea even looking on my screen here what the difference
| between the first three is supposed to be, and the numerals in
| the three thereafter are only legible because I'm staring at a
| bright screen, not swearing into the void in my laundry room,
| trying to find a better light.
|
| All that aside, I feel I'd still have to look their new
| interpretations up. International visual vernacular .. doesn't
| really exist.
| novosel wrote:
| Those labels are printed too small for all intended audiences.
|
| I propose a Moore's law of a label printing density doubling
| every 18 months (years?).
| mc32 wrote:
| Yeah, also the mercury thermometer sideways?! It's counter-
| intuitive. That said, the new symbolism slightly improves upon
| the old one which is not intuitive at all. You have to learn
| what they mean and then they're fine. They're just not
| intuitive.
|
| The water temp in the old one is expressed much more clearly
| than the new one.
|
| The most significant improvement is the bleach/no bleach
| symbol. The rest either don't improve much or actually make
| things less legible.
|
| Also, sidenote the "drying" symbol looks a bit like the
| hotsprings/onsen symbol --the official symbol is a little diff
| as it has an oval, but on roadsigns they drop the oval
| sometimes so it looks very similar (see U+2668)
| bbarnett wrote:
| I really find the idea that "having to know, or lookup stuff",
| as a problem, offensive.
|
| Laundry is literally filled with things to know, outside of
| these symbols. Household tasks are.
|
| I don't see labels on bleech bottles, saying not to mix it with
| vinegar or you could die. Yet people have done that in the
| wash, so why not start there?
|
| Here's what each sane person should do, who actually takes time
| to look at tags. (after all if you couldn't care less, and
| never look at tags, what's the point?)
|
| Print a copy of the extended tag list out, and hang it in the
| laundry room at home. I have a cabinet where I keep extra
| detergent, etc, so I taped it up on the inside of the door.
|
| Problem sovled.
|
| For a laundrymat, for your smartphone, download a properly
| formatted, for easy phone viewing version.
|
| _Done._
|
| Non-problem, compared to expecting the entire planet to change.
| We don't need another standard!!
|
| All that would happen is I'd have two standards to look at.
| croes wrote:
| Perhaps the symbols should simply be printed on the detergent
| packaging together with an explanation.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| In what language(s)? Then you run out of room on the
| packaging/waste paper. The point of symbols is that they
| can tell more information in a smaller space and can be
| recognized universally.
|
| Maybe you gotta look them up on your own, but after a
| while, you learn the ones you need to.
| Fatnino wrote:
| Bleach and vinegar are both acidic, it's acids and bases
| (like ammonia. Main ingredient in Windex) that should not be
| mixed due to the potentially toxic gases they will produce.
| leephillips wrote:
| So very wrong. Bleach is pH 12 or so.
|
| (Chlorine) bleach mixed with ammonia (which is a base) or
| any acid, including vinegar, will release the chemical
| weapon chlorine gas.
| jeffwask wrote:
| Bleach's pH is above 7 therefore it is alkaline not acidic
| Flimm wrote:
| I would highly recommend reading some UX classics such as:
|
| - The Inmate Are Running The Asylum by Alan Cooper
|
| - The Design of Everyday Things by Donald Norman
|
| (and I'm sure there are many more good resources that are
| recent than that.)
|
| It's very easy as tech-savvy people like us to underestimate
| how hard technology, even conventions like laundry symbols,
| are. I personally have printed out a legend explaining the
| laundry symbols and put them near to my washing machine, but
| I'm the only person I know who does that. Everyone else
| guesses or struggles to use laundry symbols correctly, or
| reads the text in English if it is provided.
|
| Now, does that mean we should change all the laundry symbols
| just because one person shared a redesign on their blog? No.
| Changing something that is so well-established has
| significant downsides and risks. But I think it's perfectly
| legitimate to spot their difficulties, and to pursue better
| UX relentlessly, with testing with real users. That's what
| separates a good (UX) designer from an engineer who produces
| something that fits their mindset but not the mindset of
| actual users.
| readthenotes1 wrote:
| They aren't well-known, at least according to the article.
|
| I myself recognize that I've seen a few of them, but since
| they are as cryptic as Egyptian hieroglyphs to me, I ignore
| them.
| iforgotpassword wrote:
| They aren't well known, but they're an international
| standard. Getting everyone to switch to a new system will
| take a huge effort. As others said above, there are just
| so many symbols that I dare to claim it is impossible to
| come up with a symbol set that is self explanatory, or
| easy to memorize. As soon as you're in doubt about any
| symbol, you'd have to look it up, and then it doesn't
| matter whether you need to look up one or three.
|
| I only know the one for temperature, the "no dryer" one,
| "wash by hand" and "no spin-dry". But like you, I don't
| give a shit. I wash everything at 60 (underwear, bed
| sheets, towels) or 40 (everything else) degC with spin-
| dry at 1400rpm.[*] Some pieces might wear faster, but so
| be it. I guess the vast majority of people does it that
| way.
|
| [*] Ok ok, except wool or cashmere, or a suit. But this
| is something I just learned from my mom at young age, not
| by researching any symbols.
| seoaeu wrote:
| > I don't see labels on bleech bottles, saying not to mix it
| with vinegar or you could die.
|
| Have you looked? Mine says "STRONG OXIDIZING AGENT: Mix only
| with water. Mixing this product with chemicals [...] may
| release hazardous gases"
| ben_w wrote:
| The vinegar, meanwhile, proudly says it is organic and
| "100% chemical-free" (yes yes, I know):
| https://www.lazada.com.ph/products/quezons-best-organic-
| spic...
| macksd wrote:
| There are warnings on my bleach bottles saying not to mix
| with things. But that didn't stop my wife from doing it once.
| Generally people don't RTFM even if you put it on the bottle
| in big red letters.
|
| edit: Just to be clear, though, I agree with you - people
| should educate themselves and the fact that people won't make
| a point of educating themselves is the problem. I've had
| multiple experiences where I paused to look up if it was safe
| to mix medications that were being given to my kids, or if it
| was safe to use a human first aid ointment on a pet.
| Sometimes the answer is 'No!' but the general reaction is
| usually "Oh I wouldn't worry about it".
| vidanay wrote:
| > I don't see labels on bleech bottles, saying not to mix it
| with vinegar or you could die.
|
| You sure about that?
| mikestew wrote:
| Well, I can't speak to _your_ tolerance for chlorine gas,
| but...
|
| Or were you saying that the bleach bottles on your shelf
| state that one should not mix bleach with acids such as
| vinegar? I'd actually have to go look at mine, but I don't
| recall a mention.
|
| So I looked: the warning is in the middle of a wall of
| text, with print so small only pedantic geeks with good,
| young eyes are going to bother. Let alone be able to read
| it, anyone over 40 will need a magnifier.
| vidanay wrote:
| I was referring to the statement that the bottles don't
| contain a warning, not about the chemical reaction that
| obviously exists.
|
| It probably doesn't specify vinegar, but a general "do
| not mix with other cleaners". If it only said vinegar,
| then someone would mix it with ammonia and when they
| died, they'd claim "it only said vinegar!"
| mikestew wrote:
| _It probably doesn 't specify vinegar, but a general "do
| not mix with other cleaners"_
|
| Without going back and straining my eyes, I don't think
| it even goes that far. Just do not mix with acids, and it
| specifically called out "urine and feces", from which I
| guess we're supposed to surmise that it is not a toilet
| cleaner? It's a difficult problem, yes, because "but it
| didn't say not to..."
|
| But again, I'm pretty sure the solution does not lie in a
| wall of 6 pt. text., regardless of what it needs to say.
| Aeolun wrote:
| That's not 'problem solved'. That's an 'acceptable
| workaround'.
|
| The problem is ultimately that the symbols are so abstract
| that nobody remembers them.
| corrral wrote:
| Are people seeing some huge benefits from paying attention to
| these symbols? I've been, as the kids say, "adulting" for
| some time, and pay no attention to them. I couldn't draw a
| single one from memory. If you showed me one, I'd only be
| able to guess at the meaning. All I do is not wash stuff that
| says "dry clean only" (it always just says it in text, I have
| no idea if there even _is_ a symbol for that) and favor
| cooler water & cooler dry cycles. I air-dry anything wool
| (if it's not in the "dry clean only" category).
|
| Color-safe detergents have been the norm since my very early
| adulthood. I remember ads for it when I was a kid but by the
| time I was buying detergent, _most_ detergent was color safe.
| I 've never even bothered to sort by color, aside from
| keeping raw denim away from everything else (on the rare
| occasions it's washed at all).
|
| What am I missing out on? My family's clothes seem to last
| just fine. My wife pays even less attention to this stuff
| than I do, and everything seems OK.
| [deleted]
| 0xffff2 wrote:
| Yeah, I can summarize my laundry habits as follows:
|
| - Dry clean formal clothes
|
| - Air dry wool
|
| - If I'm going through a raw denim phase, keep it out of
| the regular laundry
|
| - Everything else goes in the washer set on permanent press
| and then in the dryer at medium heat
|
| Never in 17 years of doing my own laundry has this system
| failed me in any way.
| jerf wrote:
| This has been one of my favorite Dilbert cartoons for a
| while: https://dilbert.com/strip/1992-12-27 It's been my
| wife & I's philosophy on clothes for a while and it's been
| working out. I'm sure it's suboptimal and I'm sure I don't
| care.
| raverbashing wrote:
| It works fine (90% of the time) until it doesn't
|
| And yes, I do pay attention (to the special cases).
| T-shirt? It's a t-shirt.
|
| Winter coat? Fancy suit? See what it says. Or send it to be
| professionally cleaned.
|
| Where it usually fails (with everyday stuff) is that people
| DNGAF and dry their clothes at 90C then come to heavily
| shrunk garments. Or with faded colors.
| jeffwask wrote:
| > I really find the idea that "having to know, or lookup
| stuff", as a problem, offensive.
|
| I tend to agree. As a culture we have the knowledge of the
| world in our pocket day in and day out yet we have become
| lazy and even obstinate about using it.
|
| I've started turning gardening and landscaping into a bit of
| a hobby with my new house. I'm constantly looking up
| specifics on plants, how to prune, and etc. It is so much
| easier than when I last had a house. The workflow no longer
| requires amassed knowledge, books, or keeping every tag that
| came with every plant.
|
| It's now:
|
| Take a photo of plant Use app to identify Get all the info
| you need
| keybored wrote:
| > I tend to agree. As a culture we have the knowledge of
| the world in our pocket day in and day out yet we have
| become lazy and even obstinate about using it.
|
| What do you think the problem (one of them) with the
| Information Age is? The affordance of lookup makes it so
| that we have to look up more and more. And then we have to
| arrange more and more information in order to make the
| frequently-needed information convenient enough to look up.
| themitigating wrote:
| Let's say that you have a set of symbols and 30% of the
| people who view them are able to derive their meaning without
| research. Why not try to increase that number? What's the
| downsides excluding the time making the new symbols.
| iratewizard wrote:
| The tags aren't that hard to remember, either. Do not bleach
| is the only one that you have to think, oh right the triangle
| is a bottle of bleach. The circle in a square is describing
| spin cycle. The circle with no square is describing drying
| without heat. The iron is describing an iron. The dots always
| represent the three levels of heat, just like on your iron.
|
| I remember this in spite of not having done laundry in 5
| years. And you're exactly right. New symbols mean little to
| me, I would still need to look them up and then there would
| be twice as many bad symbols.
|
| This redesign article is an example of why you should avoid
| UI/UX people who can only design. They'll change your
| branding everytime they get bored and create more headache
| than they solve.
| Izkata wrote:
| > The circle with no square is describing drying without
| heat.
|
| That's the square with no circle, the circle with no square
| is very different.
| 0xffff2 wrote:
| > The dots always represent the three levels of heat, just
| like on your iron.
|
| Just to highlight how non-universal these symbol are, I
| have never had an iron that has three levels of heat or
| that represents the levels with dots.
| carlmr wrote:
| I think they are a lot more intuitive than the old ones, but
| I'd need to look up some stuff. I don't know what's the
| difference between normal, perm press and delicate for example.
| Or why the 3 knobs on the washing machine should represent it
|
| The flask for bleach, and the drying symbols are much clearer
| though.
|
| The detail in some is a bit too high for some clothing tags,
| I'd agree on that.
| semi-extrinsic wrote:
| Speaking of bleach though - when was the last time anyone
| here used bleach while washing clothes? I have never in my
| entire life done so.
| p_l wrote:
| Maybe not regularly, as bleach is quite damaging to fabric
| and others, but often enough to have a bottle of bleach
| available in laundry room
| semi-extrinsic wrote:
| Ok, just to clarify, do people say "bleach" when the mean
| products containing sodium percarbonate (like Vanish,
| OxiClean)? Or do you mean actual bleach (as in sodium
| hypochlorite)?
| p_l wrote:
| Well, I mostly use things like Vanish/OxiClean, but there
| are times when I hit proper bleach - but admittedly that
| one is rare enough (especially since switching to
| coloured bedsheets) that I do not keep bottle of sodium
| hypochlorite on hand.
| frosted-flakes wrote:
| Actual bleach. I typically use oxi-clean, very rarely use
| bleach. I've found that even the most severe
| staining/yellowing can be removed by soaking the clothes
| in the washer overnight with oxi-clean (something that's
| not really possible with front loader machines).
| csixty4 wrote:
| I use it all the time. In fact I was staying at an airbnb
| recently and my hair dye stained all his towels and pillow
| cases (a week after I got it done!) so I gave them a good
| bleaching before I left and left them sparkling white.
| leephillips wrote:
| I use it frequently.
| mikeryan wrote:
| So I wear reading glasses and I'm with you the first 9
| "improved" icons are indistinguishable to me at a glance. In
| particular the older ones with 20/30/50 are instantly readable
| where the new ones are not.
|
| The iconography is updated which is nice but the line weights
| are too thick.
| april_22 wrote:
| line weights are too thick.
|
| Way too thick, overlapping and thats why probably impossible
| to print on most textile labal printers. I also find most of
| the labels looking the same - similar to when Google
| redesigned their icons and not everyone liked it.
|
| https://9to5google.com/2020/10/06/gmail-logo-workspace-
| redes...
| leephillips wrote:
| I came here to make the same point you did. The originals are
| superior, largely because their open design will remain legible
| after significant deterioration. The slight increase in
| obviousness of the redesign is not worth the loss in
| legibility. I still don't know what most of the new symbols are
| supposed to mean.
|
| Also, I missed a link to a legend for the original design, for
| which the author's animated version does not compensate.
| quitit wrote:
| Also some are equally confusing as the originals.
|
| There isnt much point in making a competing standard as we
| already know what happens (more confusion, more fractured
| knowledge, etc.)
|
| Instead, just print a laundry chart and leave it with the
| washer.
|
| As for whitegoods manufacturers: they could, as a minimum,
| describe their various wash and dry settings using the
| appropriate symbols rather than marketing terms.
| assttoasstmgr wrote:
| The failure of this UI/UX "expert" to grasp this most basic
| common sense detail is why modern websites and applications are
| generally speaking top-heavy UI/UX disasters.
|
| Over the last 15 years or so I think we've taken a few giant
| steps backwards as we let freewheeling artists take over. Yet
| go back to the early 80s and look at the original Macintosh UI
| which was designed by an artist - Susan Kare - with complete
| elegance and simplicity. What has happened? Just because
| computers have increased in speed doesn't mean the complexity
| of the artwork must increase proportionally - often at the
| expense of usability.
| scrame wrote:
| That, and the line-dry one looks like a turd with stink lines.
| bergenty wrote:
| They are way more recognizable. When I looked at the example
| label at the end I immediately knew what all those new symbols
| meant. I still didn't know what the original ones meant on the
| left.
| llamajams wrote:
| UX designers everywhere: "this doesn't look like sex on my
| retina pro"
| atx42 wrote:
| I don't think they did real world testing on the "improved"
| ones. I'd say it's obvious the number thirty could use a degree
| sign after it, but making it smaller and putting a box around
| it instead of in water, makes zero sense to me.
| masklinn wrote:
| > Within a second of seeing the 'improved' ones I spot what is,
| to my mind at least, an immediate failure - the detail
| resolution is far too small.
|
| Indeed, especially given the current nonsense is commonly
| unreadable already after just a wash or two (if not before
| you've washed the garment).
| secretsatan wrote:
| I know a few of the symbols, mostly to check if I can actually
| stick the clothes I'm buying in a washing machine or if they
| are effectively a single use item (for me). After checking I
| can wash them, the most important value after that would be the
| temperature, which is no longer readable. I say that, but I
| stick everything at 30 anyway... (Alright, some things I know
| are safe to wash at 60deg, like bathroom towels, so they get
| the extra heat)
| crispyambulance wrote:
| My whole adult life, I've ignored all laundry labels and just
| followed recommendations on the dial of the washer also,
| crucially, I've learned to assiduously avoid attempting to wash
| or dry any of my wife's clothes as that requires careful
| inspection of each item with dire consequences for each mistake.
|
| Curious about those middle temperature settings. It seems like a
| lot of levels: 70C, 60C, 50C, 40C. What fabric would be fine at
| 40C, but 50C would be "too hot"?
|
| I mean, I understand that some synthetics or wool would have a
| problem with extreme heat like 95C, and some might need to be at
| room temp for color to stay. But beyond that, isn't one "middle
| level" enough?
| ThinkingGuy wrote:
| For me the biggest problem with laundry symbols is that they're
| often printed so small that after a few washes they become too
| blurry to recognize.
|
| Also, while I can feel with my hand whether water is "cold,"
| "warm," or "hot." I honestly have no idea what the actual
| temperature of the water in my washer is in degrees Celsius.
|
| Furthermore, I live in the US (which is not where any of my
| clothes are made), so there's the added step of trying to convert
| the degrees from Celsius to Fahrenheit.
| masklinn wrote:
| > Also, while I can feel with my hand whether water is "cold,"
| "warm," or "hot." I honestly have no idea what the actual
| temperature of the water in my washer is in degrees Celsius.
|
| The explicit temperatures are for machine washing, don't you
| just... set the washing temperature to whatever you want?
|
| If you're washing by hand, it's unlikely that you're washing
| above 40C, and that's if you like hurting yourself: at 50C
| (120F) serious burns take about 10mn, at 60C (140F) it's around
| 3 seconds.
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| My US market washing machine has settings for "hot", "warm",
| and "cold", but if there's a way to set temperature to a
| number, it is not intuitive and I am not aware of it (it may
| exist this is a 'digital' machine!). If it did have a way to
| set a wash temp to an arbitrary number, it would presumably
| be in F not C!
|
| I think this is typical for US washing machines?
|
| Do (eg) European washing machines instead typically have you
| set wash temp to an arbitrary number of degC?
| cameronh90 wrote:
| All washing machines I've used in the UK have a temperature
| selector dial. They usually offer a number of presets such
| as 30c, 40c, 60c and 90c.
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| Interesting! I don't believe that's how USA washing
| machines work, they usually just say "hot", "warm", and
| "cold".
|
| Apparently USAians are washing machine philistines who
| don't need more than three temperatures and don't know
| what they are?
|
| Anyway, this shows another challenge in these icons, the
| international diversity of washing techniques and
| technology.
|
| (Edit: I found one possible answer online -- Euro washing
| machines may actually have water heaters built in, while
| American washing macchines may just use the existing
| house "hot water supply". So Euro machines can heat to
| desired temp, while American ones just have to take what
| they get! Why THAT was done that way, I don't know,
| difference in hot water heating technology choices? Euro
| houses don't usually have a central "hot water tank" like
| US has? Why THAT is would be yet another question...).
| bombcar wrote:
| I suspect washers with heaters come from places that
| original had cold water only.
|
| The reality is we are overthinking it - "cold/warm/hot"
| is about all we need, and "warm" is really just "fill as
| fast as possible" often, since it opens both hoses.
| bzxcvbn wrote:
| The water comes out 60+degC out of your faucets?
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| Shocking as it will be to you -- I'm just realizing that
| this differs between US and rest of world -- a home
| washing machine in the US can only go as hot as what
| comes out of the faucets. It cannot wash at 90C water,
| and likely can't even do 60C water. It can only do as hot
| as the "hot" tap water, which depends on what the hot
| water heat is set at, which is usually somewhere between
| 120F (49C) and 140F (60C).
| bombcar wrote:
| Do people really boil clothes? Obviously that's not a
| thing in the US, but I could see it being useful for
| whites, perhaps.
| masklinn wrote:
| > Do people really boil clothes? Obviously that's not a
| thing in the US, but I could see it being useful for
| whites, perhaps.
|
| It's usually for really sturdy whites you want to
| disinfect after they've been soiled for instance. Use of
| that program has definitely gone way down over time. The
| energy requirements alone make it not a routine wash
| thing.
|
| It's also used to basically deep clean the washing
| machine itself.
| bombcar wrote:
| It seems that the high-end commercial units for
| hospitals, etc come with a steam inlet and the option for
| an electrical heater added:
|
| https://unimac.com/products/washer-extractors/high-
| performan...
| bombcar wrote:
| It could, but there's a temperature control valve
| limiting it to 115deg or 120deg, I forget which.
|
| If I wanted to bother I could run the "raw" hot water to
| the washer to get 140deg IIRC.
| el-salvador wrote:
| In Latin America our home washing machines are usually
| connected to 'cold' water only. Except in homes with
| separate cold/hot water pipes.
| masklinn wrote:
| It's the same in europe. I know semi-professional or
| professional dishwashers are sometimes connected to both
| hot and cold inputs, not sure whether that is the case
| for washing machines though I wouldn't be shocked.
| masklinn wrote:
| > I found one possible answer online -- Euro washing
| machines may actually have water heaters built in, while
| American washing macchines may just use the existing
| house "hot water supply". So Euro machines can heat to
| desired temp, while American ones just have to take what
| they get!
|
| Ah so it's the same deal as the dishwashers, I should
| have figured.
|
| > Euro houses don't usually have a central "hot water
| tank" like US has? Why THAT is would be yet another
| question...).
|
| Commonly not, although it does absolutely exist water is
| frequently heated up on-demand.
|
| However a better reason might be the same as the kettle
| thing: the US being on 120V, so getting hot water out the
| furnace or hot water tank is waaay faster than heating it
| up on the spot.
| robonerd wrote:
| > the US being on 120V
|
| Driers, and similar high power appliances, don't use a
| single 120V phase. They use two phrases, 180 degrees
| apart in normal residential houses and 120 degrees apart
| in apartment buildings. Any American clothing dryer I've
| ever seen has 240V (slightly less in apartment
| buildings.)
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| > might be the same as the kettle thing: the US being on
| 120V,
|
| I think you could be right about washing
| machines/dishwashers, but as far as electric kettles...
| even at US 120V, an electric kettle is WAY faster at
| heating water to boiling than even my fairly powerful
| (bigger than traditional burner) gas range. (Not to
| mention much more energy-efficient).
|
| I have no idea why electric kettles aren't more popular
| in the US.
|
| But I never thought about the 110V/230V thing with regard
| to kettles. I guess even though electric kettles in the
| US are faster than the stovetop, they still aren't as
| fast as everywhere else with 230V? Maybe "faster but not
| faster enough" is why people still heat water on a
| stovetop here? I don't know!
| plorkyeran wrote:
| Heating water on a stovetop isn't actually particularly
| common. We don't have electric kettles because we have
| coffee makers instead.
| jrochkind1 wrote:
| Most people that I know who make tea make it by heating
| water on the stovetop, and don't realize or don't care
| how much better an electric kettle could be; but of
| course you're right that coffee is much more popular than
| tea here, and perhaps that's why electric kettles aren't
| more well-known as superior for heating water.
|
| I do not think it's because of 110V though! Even a 110V
| electric kettle is far faster than stovetop.
| plorkyeran wrote:
| My apartment's washing machines don't even have
| hot/warm/cold. It has "bright colors", "colors", and
| "whites", which _hopefully_ correspond to three different
| temperatures, and then things like "delicates" where the
| temperature is a surprise (I hope it's cold?).
| masklinn wrote:
| > My US market washing machine has settings for "hot",
| "warm", and "cold"
|
| What the hell? That's barbaric.
|
| > Do (eg) European washing machines instead typically have
| you set wash temp to an arbitrary number of degC?
|
| Not arbitrary except possibly on high-end machines but even
| entry-level stuff have temp settings for the usual stuff:
| cold (whatever's out the tap), 30, 40, 60, 90.
| robonerd wrote:
| How do you ever decide whether a load of laundry needs 30
| or 40? Do you sum up all the laundry labels on each item
| of clothing then take the average?
|
| Personally, I leave my machine set to hot for everything.
| Hot water is what I use for washing in my dish washer, in
| my sink, in my shower.. hot water is for washing. That's
| how I see it.
| masklinn wrote:
| > How do you ever decide whether a load of laundry needs
| 30 or 40? Do you sum up all the laundry labels on each
| item of clothing then take the average?
|
| If you have enough laundry I expect you try to put stuff
| with similar requirements together in the same way you
| segregate whites and colors.
|
| Though usually unless your laundry is quite dirty you'd
| go with 30 standard and shove everything in there, at 30
| color shouldn't even be too much of a factor.
|
| In all honesty I'm not quite sure why both are present, I
| think it's because older generations believed 30 would
| not be enough (as it's "human range" water), so 30 or
| cold would only be for the clothes which can't go any
| higher and 40 was the baseline.
| TwoHeadedBeast wrote:
| Yes, typically 30, 40, 50, 60 and 90.
| bricemo wrote:
| To truly call this an improvement, he needs to re-run the
| evaluation test to see what percentage of respondents can
| correctly identify the new icons
| Melatonic wrote:
| In addition to all of these symbols I would like to see just a
| simple "type 1, type 2, type 3, type 4" OVERALL code added to
| each thing. If something is a type1 that could mean cold wash
| machine okay, tumble dry low, iron low/medium. A type 4 could be
| the fragile stuff - hand wash only cold water, mild detergent, no
| iron, no tumble dry. These wouldnt encompass everything but at
| least we could have a very quick guide to memorize.
| AnotherGoodName wrote:
| I don't check except for the occasional fancy shirt and even then
| it's only for iron temperature which is clear enough.
|
| Dyes, machines and laundry detergent all changed for the better.
| I haven't inadvertently made things pink in 20 years now. The red
| now holds. Even new jeans come prewashed. My machine seems to be
| much gentler too.
| dpratt wrote:
| I would refer the author of this piece to read about Chesterton's
| Fence, and then think about it in context of the subject of his
| article.
|
| "There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us
| say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a
| road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and
| says, 'I don't see the use of this; let us clear it away.' To
| which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to
| answer: 'If you don't see the use of it, I certainly won't let
| you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come
| back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you
| to destroy it.'"
| [deleted]
| the_mitsuhiko wrote:
| While I agree that the original icons are quite confusing they
| are incredibly googleable and they are also printed in manuals
| everywhere and super easy to match. More importantly there are
| apps like Laundry Lens which can reliably detect them and explain
| them.
| pimlottc wrote:
| It's a decent start, but without testing, there's no evidence
| that these icons are any better than the originals.
|
| I'm not sure that they even meets the authors own objectives --
| there are more small details that are harder to resolve at small
| sizes and likely would be harder to print clearly. They also
| aren't any more "googleable" than the originals.
|
| Lastly, they also assume that users are familiar with front
| loading washing machines, which may not be common in some places.
| It could easily be interpreted as a tumble dryer.
| blowski wrote:
| Agreed. I wonder whether something like a QR code that takes
| you to a page with instructions is more simple as a solution.
| Hook that up to a smart washing machine, and it will set the
| appropriate instructions, or tell you if you have an
| incompatible load.
|
| All that said, I've been ignoring the labels for years, and
| never had a problem.
| Izkata wrote:
| A better solution apparently already exists:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31824399
| pronik wrote:
| The key assumption with this redesign is basically the same as
| with the old one: we are supposed to immediately understand what
| this icon is supposed to mean. However, what will our assumptions
| about things be in about 50 years, which is how long the previous
| icons existed? Will we even recognize a washing machine with its
| porthole as such or will it be the case of a 3.5" floppy as a
| "Save" icon, which has confused people for the last 15 years?
|
| And besides that: do we really need new icons? Make an app which
| will recognize and interpret the icons and you are done without
| making several gigantic industries replace well-known and well-
| working pieces of their daily work.
| bluSCALE4 wrote:
| Designer must be midwesterner: push button, get bacon.
| bluSCALE4 wrote:
| https://ih1.redbubble.net/image.791778944.7289/bg,f8f8f8-fla...
| [deleted]
| antux wrote:
| The new icons are bad. There are small distinguishing details
| that are hard to notice at small sizes. The icons need to be more
| simple, concrete, and recognizable.
| Terry_Roll wrote:
| Now find a washing machine with programs that match the washing
| symbols, even if its only documented in their manuals.
|
| Its not a hard task building a washing machine or tumble dryer
| that matches the washing symbols, but it seems to be for the
| current industry leaders!
| aceazzameen wrote:
| The author has a point that a redesign could be more intuitive
| and understandable. Unfortunately the provided redesigns don't
| fit the bill.
|
| There's some decent ideas here though. The shape of the bleach
| bottle, the circular motion of the arrows indicating tumble, a
| thermometer, and a dry cleaning bag. Unfortunately, the execution
| isn't as good as it should be. The strokes are too thick, and
| detailing is too crowded.
|
| If anything, this is a decent first draft. But I would send it
| back with notes. The most important one being: less is more. And
| it's okay to leave existing icons alone that already work.
| Perhaps redesign within the constraints of the existing style,
| rather than creating a new style?
| pydry wrote:
| All this article has really convinced me is that a sticker
| explaining what all the laundry symbols are would be a good use
| of the flat top of washing machines/dryers.
| penneyd wrote:
| Now that's a great idea!
| londons_explore wrote:
| Laundry symbols make no sense... So let's get rid of them!
|
| Let's simply make all clothes compatible with a regular wash and
| tumble dry process.
|
| If the clothes use a dye that isn't waterproof, use a different
| dye. If the fabric is too fragile to withstand spinning, use a
| stronger fabric. If a material can't withstand the heat of a
| dryer, use better material.
|
| Material science has come so far in the past 100 years that we
| can meet or exceed the performance of pretty much any of last
| centuries materials _while also_ being able to make the stuff
| washable.
| The-Bus wrote:
| Just so you understand how this sounds to someone who works in
| (or cares about) apparel:
|
| Computers make no sense! So let's simplify them. Let's just
| have one kind of laptop, desktop, server, and phone. With the
| same operating system.
|
| Why are we still using so many different kinds of computers?
| Cd00d wrote:
| Is this humor?
|
| Because the symbols need to be looked up we shouldn't use silk
| any more??
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| I understand the desire to simplify things you don't
| understand, but this would never work. You'd have to destroy
| the entire fashion industry first.
| npteljes wrote:
| Let's simply centrally mandate one standard that everyone
| adheres to? In what universe is that simple?
| peanut_worm wrote:
| The improved ones still seem really vague to me
| bowsamic wrote:
| It is strange to me how the author praises the aesthetics of the
| original designs and then goes on to produce such an ugly set of
| symbols
| mhandley wrote:
| Even if they didn't try to pack in too much detail, I still think
| many of the redesigned symbols are less obvious than the
| originals. A square with a circle in it - is that the washer or
| the dryer? They're both boxes with round doors for most people
| these days. But the tub of water - at least I know intuitively
| that must mean washing. Similarly a conical flask for bleach - I
| guess I know that's something chemical, but is it bleach or dry
| cleaning? Whereas a triangle is always a warning, so it's not
| hard to associate with the only toxic thing in the laundry room.
| All irons I've ever used have dots on the temperature scale, not
| a half-filled old school thermometer, so that's also one that
| doesn't need improving. I'm not saying there's no room for
| improvement - the wavy lines for drying are certainly better than
| another ambiguous box with a circle in it - but many of the
| originals are pretty good.
| nimbius wrote:
| Oh you think _laundry_ is bad...let me introduce you to the bane
| of my apprenticeship...
|
| Welding symbols:
|
| https://weldingpros.net/welding-symbols/
| trynewideas wrote:
| the optimism of consistently printing (or stitching!) symbols
| with this level of detail across fabric types, from printed tags
| to printed on-fabric to stitched tags, that will also remain
| readable after frequent wear and cleaning
|
| ignoring the existing multiplicity of existing standards (ISO vs.
| ASTM vs. GINETEX vs. Japan vs. OTEXA/CGSB/Canada) to propose
| another one, especially when many of the changes he makes were at
| one point implemented in a non-English-speaking nation for
| decades[1] and then abandoned for the international standard that
| he doesn't like
|
| redesigning all future clothing to use a new standard that can be
| confused or conflict with existing standards that will remain in
| use for decades because no older non-compliant clothing will be
| immediately destroyed, much less all
|
| missing more actionable user-focused solutions that don't require
| a new standard, such as adding standardized, well-designed,
| localized symbol keys on points of interaction, like laundry
| supplies and equipment
|
| all leading to a point not of action but to "bring more awareness
| to the cost" of something the author and his immediate audience
| personally does not understand, but which is not necessarily
| broadly misunderstood
|
| and for that matter is only believed by the author to be broadly
| misunderstood because of an out-of-context, entertaining blog
| post[2] where, for mildly career-connected fun and LinkedIn
| social engagement, the researcher texted her mom and some
| personal friends and came to a half-joking conclusion appropriate
| to the post's mostly unserious tone ("I am predictably going to
| advocate more user research on the matter") that's neither
| mentioned nor applied by the author
|
| [1] https://www.sbs-zipper.com/blog/japan-implements-new-
| clothin...
|
| [2] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/speed-user-research-
| question-...
| memorable wrote:
| Alt link:
|
| https://scribe.rip/m/global-identity?redirectUrl=https%3A%2F...
| leokennis wrote:
| 1. Add a QR code to the labels pointing to a
| "washingstructions://" scheme
|
| 2. Add said scheme to iOS and Android
|
| 3. Scan the QR code
|
| 4. iOS or Android show the washing instructions in
| text/icons/images, of course localized
| [deleted]
| AdamH12113 wrote:
| I have always found laundry symbols confusing. I agree with other
| comments that this proposed replacement has too many problems to
| be acceptable, but surely _someone_ can do better than "crossed-
| out triangle", "underlined water cup", "Cylon wearing a jaunty
| cap", and my personal favorite, "literally just a circle".
|
| Weird fact: Despite having been around for decades, laundry
| symbols have not been assigned Unicode code points. This mailing
| list email from Ken Whistler in 2003[1] suggests the existence of
| a conflicting Canadian standard as a reason, along with a
| philosophy of not including "icons" (especially color-coded
| ones!) in a "character" set, given that pictographic language is
| likely to change over the next century.
|
| (Unicode threw that out the window in 2010 when they standardized
| emojis, and given how complex emojis have become Ken's argument
| is sounding better and better...)
|
| [1] http://unicode.org/mail-arch/unicode-ml/y2003-m06/0274.html
| 99_00 wrote:
| Are the benefits of an improvement worth the cost?
|
| Do you know how to do your laundry despite not knowing how to
| read the symbols?
| AdamH12113 wrote:
| I wash all my laundry on cold and dry on low heat because I'm
| fat and don't want my clothes to shrink. I have eight of the
| same black cotton T-shirt. I do not separate my laundry. I do
| not wear any exotic fabrics, designer clothes, or bright
| colors, and if I did, I would wash them in the same load of
| laundry as my other clothes. I am not a benchmark for laundry
| ability. Maybe there's some easy, incremental improvement I
| could make. But the current symbols do not help me do that.
|
| All I'm saying is that maybe, with the full power of graphic
| design, we could have something a little more self-
| explanatory than triangle = bleach, circle = dry clean. The
| iron symbol is perfectly clear, for instance.
| seszett wrote:
| > we could have something a little more self-explanatory
| than triangle = bleach, circle = dry clean. The iron symbol
| is perfectly clear, for instance.
|
| I think you (and others) are focusing on the wrong thing
| here. Are you likely to bleach your black t-shirts? Are you
| likely to dry clean them?
|
| No, certainly not, these are special, rather uncommon
| processes that are unlikely to be part of one's daily
| washing routing, and therefore it doesn't really matter if
| they're not immediately obvious.
|
| The washing and ironing temperature, as well as the hand
| wash symbol, are the ones that actually matter and they're
| also quite obvious. The tumble dry symbols are maybe less
| obvious and common enough today, they probably seemed like
| they were one of the less common processes back in the 70's
| in France (where tumble driers are only just beginning to
| be common today). I'm pretty sure you should ignore the "no
| tumble dry" symbols most of the time anyway if your tumble
| drier is more recent than the 70's. That's what I do.
|
| So if you just ignore the symbols you don't understand, in
| most cases and for most people, everything will be fine and
| you will simply know what maximum temperature to wash your
| clothes.
| 99_00 wrote:
| >Maybe there's some easy, incremental improvement I could
| make. But the current symbols do not help me do that.
|
| I'd be curious what the users of the labels think. If they
| exist.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| There's nothing wrong with the symbols. Your washing machine is
| the one that should have a printed table of them somewhere.
|
| Take a look on those symbols: "A", "B", "C". A triangle with
| the basis moved up, two circles with a straight side, and an
| open circumference arc. They were abstract into complete
| meaningless, yet they are great for their use-case.
| robonerd wrote:
| > _Your washing machine is the one that should have a printed
| table of them somewhere._
|
| Neither of my laundry machines have any symbols on their
| control panels, only printed English. The only symbols I can
| find on them are the Explosion, Fire, and Shock warning
| stickers inside the rim of the doors.
| PebblesRox wrote:
| I think OP meant "should" as in "ought to" not "should" as
| in "probably does."
| nmca wrote:
| fwiw the Roman alphabet seems pretty suboptimal and the
| impossibility of switching is an example of a coordination
| problem, as opposed to an example of optimal design
| 99_00 wrote:
| What is the cost/impact of laundry symbols making no sense to
| people like the author and me?
|
| I don't seem to have problems doing laundry despite not
| understanding the care label.
| vr46 wrote:
| I think the big mistake here is to assume that the original
| symbols were the right way of representing the information needed
| at all.
|
| A clear number for temperature on its own, followed by a separate
| symbol for a machine or a hand would be clearer than piling one
| onto another.
| aristofun wrote:
| Is it me or the redesigned ones make equally same sense as
| original -- none?
| jszymborski wrote:
| A lot of these are good, but changing the wash basin to a front-
| loading washer is a mistake IMHO. There are plenty of people
| around the world who don't machine wash their clothes, and a
| water basin feels like the ur-washer, the platonic ideal.
| butz wrote:
| I'm adding custom NFC tags to all my laundry with encoded washing
| instructions, color and material data. Placing laundry in "smart"
| basket will read all data from them (this part is currently more
| involved, as you need to scan each article of clothing
| separately), and send instructions to washing machine for most
| optimal program (that's a problem too, as I do not own "smart"
| washing machine, yet). If there are some outliers, e.g. black
| shirt in otherwise white-ish laundry - I will be informed to
| remove it, for best results.
| kqr wrote:
| Huh. I'm not the one doing laundry in our household, and I still
| know all the four symbols that were hand-drawn on the paper
| there.
|
| To remember that the circle is dry cleaning it helps to know that
| it can circumscribe letters indicating what type of dry cleaning
| process is allowed.
|
| The tumble dry symbol just looks like a tumble dryer, and the
| washing symbol the same. Bleach is the tricky one but can be
| remembered because it's not one of the others.
| kergonath wrote:
| How are the proposed ones more legible, particularly at small
| scales?
|
| How is embedding a representation of what a washing machine looks
| like now makes them more universal or recognisable?
|
| Despite the couple of paragraphs pontificating about what good
| icons should be, most of them are much worse than the cleaner,
| simpler, older ones. The drying ones are more descriptive, but
| less legible.
| browningstreet wrote:
| I'm traveling right now and had to pin this web page to decipher
| the symbols on the washing machines in my airbnbs:
|
| https://washerhouse.com/en/perevod-terminov/
| kukx wrote:
| What about, instead of changing the symbols we add text. Or just
| teach them at school :) Symbols are great for brevity and
| aesthetics, but they have to be learned to be useful. Oh I got an
| idea, what about a QR code with all the info included, you just
| have to scan it ;)
| graypegg wrote:
| The difference between their "Mild drying process" and "normal
| drying process" is nearly impossible to perceive on a screen with
| the only difference being a few extra pixels on a thermometer.
| Pretty important to understand the difference between those if
| you like clothes that fit.
|
| I wonder why they felt it necessary to keep everything as a
| single icon? Wouldn't be as impossible to print/stitch or read if
| the icons were larger nouns + modifiers.
| superasn wrote:
| With exception to the bleach symbol I find most of the new and
| improved symbols hard to read and just as confusing and maybe
| even worse.
|
| Also as other commenters have said it will do a much worse job
| when the fabric is faded or somebody without a 20/20 vision.
|
| I think somebody else needs to take a shot at this again.
| abanayev wrote:
| The goal of a universal semiotics for garment care reminds me of
| the goal of a universal semiotics for nuclear waste warnings [1],
| and the physical constraints of printing at small resolutions
| remind me of the corresponding constraints of making the warning
| symbols outlast tens of thousands of years of weather and human
| disruption.
|
| [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long-
| term_nuclear_waste_warn...
| hulitu wrote:
| > Laundry symbols make no sense So I redesigned them, with all
| due respect.
|
| Another failed GUI designer. If it worked for so many years, a
| lot of people are familiar with them. Why repeat the Windows GUI
| experience ? I get that the first phones were slow and doing
| things in Java didn't help and recognizing that the GUI is crap
| would not help with market adoption, but let's not pretend that
| Material design or reinventing a GUI every two years is
| innovative.
| phailhaus wrote:
| > If it worked for so many years, a lot of people are familiar
| with them
|
| The thesis is that they don't work, at all. I have to look them
| up every time because they are absolutely inscrutable today.
| Laundry symbols are rarely looked at for most folks, so they
| have to be maximally communicative. It's not good enough if the
| only people that know what they mean are those that deal with
| them constantly.
| replygirl wrote:
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| Not the op, but I'm an old straight male _and_ the laundry
| queen of the household.
|
| If it doesn't go into Normal Cold Wash / Low heat tumble
| dry, it has no place in our household - life is too short!
| :)
| NullPrefix wrote:
| Original->Redesigned chart didn't have to be a gif
| Solvitieg wrote:
| Seriously. A great post about bad UX uses bad UX during the
| climax
| RedShift1 wrote:
| The original symbols were _engineered_. These new symbols are
| _designed_. There's a difference, and this falls into the same
| shortcomings of many modern UI designers: they only design for
| what appeals to them personally.
| kleer001 wrote:
| Yes, that's how symbols work.
|
| Arabic numerals make no sense. Kanji makes no sense. The Roman
| alphabet makes no sense. Of course, they're symbols. You memorize
| them. They stand for the object they're pointing at. They're not
| abstractions meant to represent directly the thing its self.
|
| Everyone, stop being so literal. Sheesh.
| timeon wrote:
| Does alphabet make sense?
| oneplane wrote:
| I wonder if the reason they don't make sense is the lack of
| common appliances and 'plastic dry cleaning covers' around the
| globe. Every iron has a dot-based temperature setting (alongside
| others, generally), but not everyone knows what a mercury
| thermometer looks like or if that means 'temperature setting'.
| jacknews wrote:
| To me the redesign shows how good the originals were.
|
| Eg, in some cases the redesign uses the 'dots' motif for strength
| of effect, and yet in others it uses a 'thermometer'. Just
| inconsistent, and actually even less intuitive.
| robonerd wrote:
| The idea of using these symbols instead of printed English is
| that not everybody speaks English, yes? Well, I don't speak
| Spanish, but I think if all of these symbols were replaced with
| printed Spanish words, it would be more useful to me than any of
| these symbols. I'd figure out what it meant with greater ease
| than these symbols; at the very least I would be able to look up
| the meaning.
|
| And if you're going to have the symbols _and_ printed text, you
| might as well omit the symbols entirely. I think both sets of
| symbols are worthless. I could probably guess what some of them
| mean if my life depended on it, but I 'm not going to.
| Deciphering symbols is a waste of my time. At least if printed
| Spanish were used, puzzling out the meaning would actually enrich
| my life. The symbols are worthless noise and I don't want their
| meaning wasting space in my brain.
| pantulis wrote:
| A very interesting exercise, but I believe the old symbols are
| not that hard to getting acquanted with. My mom explained them to
| me... what, three decades ago? Of course I don't remember most of
| them, but I usually buy the same types of clothes so I basically
| always use the same program.
|
| Additionally, laundry & ironing professionals have those symbols
| more than memorized ;)
| nsxwolf wrote:
| The glass thermometer in 2022 seems a bit like using a 3.5"
| floppy disk as a save icon, and I don't think it would show up
| very well on a tiny clothing tag.
| smegsicle wrote:
| "trying to come up with a better save symbol than a floppy disk
| is like trying to come up with a better temperature symbol than
| a mercury thermometer"
|
| i agree with this part of your premise (and also that a
| thermometer would be hard to read on a tiny tag)
| Apreche wrote:
| I just have a symbol guide printed out and laminated next to the
| laundry machine. After referencing it enough times eventually you
| memorize it. No big deal.
| Swenrekcah wrote:
| I don't do this yet but this was my first reaction to seeing
| this page. The originals are a bit cryptic when you don't know
| them, but simple and easy to memorize and even easier to match
| against a printed sheet next to your washing machine.
|
| I will go and make one sheet for me now.
|
| In fact, this is the stuff that should be part of a high-school
| curriculum!
| itisit wrote:
| I can totally get behind the value of a design exercise in
| revisiting popular symbols, but one thing I rarely (and
| unfortunately) see is an admission that the originals are
| better. Tags wear out and tag print size varies, which the
| originals account for in their simple distinguishable shapes.
| And the learning curve is negligible, as you allude to.
|
| This post reminds me of when a junior dev refactors a bit of
| code that they now find to be well-crafted and intelligible
| simply because it came from their own mind. However, the result
| is often just as esoteric and convoluted, or it's even worse!
| IshKebab wrote:
| I think these are definitely better. Especially bleach and dry
| clean.
|
| The originals are too abstract. Unless you memorise them you
| basically have to look them up every time. Which is probably why
| most clothes also have English text telling you what to do on the
| label.
|
| The new ones obviously have too small details to print on a
| typical label but I think that could be fixed fairly easily.
| RGamma wrote:
| Ehh after a couple washes these symbols come off completely
| anyway; bet you can't design around that!
| ibejoeb wrote:
| It's a step up from cuneiform.
|
| If you really want people to understand, it should probably be
| just arabic numerals. They're almost universally understand, and
| then you can just look it up in your language or print out the
| chart and put it next to the machine.
| ruined wrote:
| come on, there's like four verbs here, and the annotations are
| intuitive if you have the context. just because you never do your
| own laundry doesn't mean the rest of us don't know what's up.
|
| they make more sense than most mobile UIs, and there's usually
| text with them anyway.
| ARandomerDude wrote:
| Hot take (or cold, delicate take with color-safe bleach if you
| prefer): if you have to pay attention to the laundry symbols,
| skip it and buy something else. Find durable clothes that are
| acceptably fashionable and forget about the laundry headache.
| causi wrote:
| The new ones are just as inscrutable as the old ones. How on
| earth am I supposed to know a washing machine with the middle
| button of three dark means "permanent press" and the right button
| of three means "delicate" without looking it up? The new "natural
| dry" looks like it means "safe for high heat". "Do not bleach"
| looks more like "do not use detergent".
|
| Frankly I think symbols that give you no impression at all are
| better than symbols that give you the _wrong_ impression.
| O__________O wrote:
| Labels are dated, please forget making the icons better.
|
| According to Statista, 80% of the world's population owns a
| smartphone. Just add a link to the instructions and have
| translations in plain language that are standardized; that is
| manufactures/brands just reuse the standard types of instructions
| that are relevant.
| robjan wrote:
| What happens when the garment manufacturer or the URL shortener
| they used to reduce the complexity of the QR code goes out of
| business? I've experienced this before.
| malfist wrote:
| That's what we need, always online laundry instructions.
| adregan wrote:
| I think I'd argue that it's beneficial in this case to lean
| towards abstract figures which must be looked up. What the
| designer calls intuitive, I might argue is actually easier to
| misinterpret.
|
| One must remember that these are international symbols and the
| cultural context you bring to interpretation is different from
| another's.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Also there is very clear design goal with originals for each
| being distinct from others. Which explains lot of design.
| kingofpandora wrote:
| Now can you decide the buttons on my toaster, please?
| robonerd wrote:
| A single dial labelled 1 through 9.
| kingofpandora wrote:
| I wish that's all it had ...
| Night_Thastus wrote:
| The GIF changes images very quickly with no way to pause. Hard to
| see them side by side.
| SkeuomorphicBee wrote:
| The redesign is to much of the author's local iconography, it is
| less "global" than the original.
|
| The worst offender being the representation of a front loading
| washing machine, while most of the developing world uses top
| loading washing machines. In my country all those "washing
| machine" icons would be incorrectly read as tumble dryer icons
| because here washers are top loaded and dryers are front loaded.
| jerojero wrote:
| As someone else points out, it would be best if these were
| included in the washing machine in some form. Printed somewhere.
| In reality these icons are quite good and once you know the
| "basics" it is easy to know which one stands for what, so I think
| in terms of design they are actually quite clever.
|
| In fact, now that I've seen the meaning of each one of them I
| think I might start to recognise them better :)
| cameronh90 wrote:
| So many laundry tags have OTT requirements. I have hoodies that
| claim dry clean only, but of course come out completely fine in
| the machine. Lots of bras say hand wash only but we've never had
| any issues with them in the machine either.
|
| Generally, we just ignore the labels and put all the clothes in a
| colour separated wash on the 30c daily eco cycle. If the clothes
| get damaged - which is rare in a modern non-agitator washing
| machine - we just don't buy that type of fabric/garment any more.
| It does reduce the clothing options a little bit, for example, no
| silk, but it's worth the improved quality of life. Laundry
| Darwinism.
|
| There are a few types of necessary item we do get dry cleaned,
| such as expensive suits and ball gowns, but at least for us those
| are rare use.
|
| The other thing that has improved our life a lot is only buying
| non-iron clothing.
| mrcartmeneses wrote:
| Conversely my t-shirts that claim to be machine washable shrink
| and need prior knowledge to keep them wearable.
|
| The physical world is complex.
|
| Interestingly most detergent works great at 30c. Hotter wash
| temps are for a time before biological enzymes were used as
| detergent additives.
| mikestew wrote:
| The detergent we buy works fine at whatever the water
| temperature is coming out of the cold side of the tap. I
| don't know that we even need to have the hot water line
| connected at our house as I don't recall the last time I used
| any temperature other than "tap cold" (I'm _really_ curious
| what plain old "cold" does; is there a chiller in there I
| don't know about?) I mean, it's not like my chemical engineer
| classmates were sitting on their asses the last 30 years,
| modern detergent ain't the stuff your Mom used.
|
| And lest one think I'm a dainty flower that doesn't get
| clothes all that dirty, just last week I was running a trail
| race, and as I do, caught my foot on a root and went diving
| downhill straight into a big pile of Pacific Northwest mud. I
| wasn't sure the mud was going to wash out of my _skin_ , let
| alone the knee socks and running outfit. One trip through the
| front loader on cold, and it's like it never happened.
| zaptheimpaler wrote:
| Maybe we shall replace all these tags with a chip and a laundry
| basket that sorts all clothes into a few piles and feeds them
| into a washer with the right settings.
| amenghra wrote:
| The old ironing symbols were fine and better than the redesigned
| ones.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Specially when I take my cheapish Iron in hand look at the
| control and see oh there is 1 dot, 2 dot and 3 dot setting...
| hoosieree wrote:
| What's the big deal, these are all very intuitive:
| no triangles adidas square one squared
| new document minus equality pig snout
| squaring the circle an eye looking through a square hole
| square minus do not square the circle iron
| iron. iron.. iron... iron deficiency
| n/a please fill in the entire circle or your answer will
| not be counted
| Pakdef wrote:
| xwdv wrote:
| Does anyone not care about these symbols? There could be so many
| permutations of options in a pile of clothing that you'd end up
| having to do so many loads. I just throw everything in and hope
| for the best.
| el-salvador wrote:
| Same for me.
|
| Most of the time I have just used the standard wash setting,
| then air dry if sunny or machine dry if raining.
|
| I'm not even sure how temperature influences washing. I'll have
| to read about that.
| bandyaboot wrote:
| Every washer and dryer should have the symbols and their meanings
| right on them. Problem solved.
| gorkish wrote:
| I wish more designers would learn how to more objectively assess
| whether their work will have positive or negative value. It's
| kind of like how the lesson that tic tac toe taches kids has
| nothing to do with the strategy of the game. The usual exercise-
| in-futility assignment for design students is to redesign a
| toaster or a ladder, but clearly there are a lot of them who
| don't really get the point.
| [deleted]
| masswerk wrote:
| Just as a reminder: Nothing is context-free. Even, if something
| may appear self-explanatory to you, there's always convention
| involved to some degree.
|
| E.g., does this symbol mean do not pack the cleaned cloth in a
| nylon envelope, or does it mean no dry cleaning? Is this an
| artificial heat source, or "natural dry"? Or is it the smelly
| process (bleaching)? Is this a closed chemical or recycling
| process, or tumbling? Also, the dot system is probably easier to
| identify and discern and more resistant to wear than the
| depiction of thermometers (which probably only work relative to
| each other, having something to compare with).
|
| Moreover, icons like these are not app icons on the home screen:
| they do not work best, if they (or their constituting elements)
| are all of even weight. Eye-sight, lighting conditions and ease
| of identification are primary aspects of this. Something like
| this should probably work by a primary context identifier,
| conveyed by the shape, and a secondary qualifier ("specificator")
| inside that shape with convenient separating whitespace around
| it.
| happytoexplain wrote:
| Wow! The new icons have unacceptably small details, and I'm not
| sure how that's not obvious to even non-designers. And yet the
| author claims their set puts usability in front of beauty, _as
| opposed to the originals_? I don 't usually write this
| negatively, but this really provoked an emotional reaction in me.
| Self-evidence is only one desirable quality of iconography, and
| it is _not_ the most important one. Legibility is the most
| important one. If I can 't read the details, or they easily wear
| off or fade, then it doesn't matter how self-describing they are.
| Sometimes you have to increase abstraction to increase legibility
| at the cost of increased learning. This is a common and accepted
| practice throughout the universe of symbology for excellent
| reasons.
|
| Edit: Another advantage of high legibility is _speed_. Even if I
| have a tag where the new symbols are legible, I won 't be
| interpreting them as quickly as the original symbols, under the
| precondition that I am already familiar with each set of symbols.
|
| Edit: I think the reason this provoked me is that I have run into
| cases where this attitude toward design created bad real world
| experiences, so I immediately want to warn away from it as soon
| as I see it even in a hypothetical case.
| Twirrim wrote:
| Something that seems a bizarre change is the iron one, almost
| makes me wonder if this is someone that ever irons clothes.
| Going from dots to a thermometer?
|
| 1) Irons have respective dots on them. I can look at the
| clothes, look at the iron, and turn the temperature dial to the
| matching setting. I'm not playing guessing games of "where on
| the dial is 1/3rd?", there's a literal dot that matches the
| symbol.
|
| 2) The temperature symbols now go from easy to distinguish to
| confusing, especially when smaller and lighting not so great.
| Is it a 1/3 of the way through? 2/3rs? Counting dots is way,
| way easier and quicker.
| Aeolun wrote:
| > If I can't read the details, or they easily wear off or fade,
| then it doesn't matter how self-describing they are.
|
| You can reverse this too. If I never understand what they mean,
| it doesn't matter that I can still read them.
|
| I mean, I agree there's too many hard to read details, but the
| originals are absolutely impenetrable.
| chrstphrknwtn wrote:
| Sure, but if at some point you actually need to know what the
| symbols mean at least the symbols will still be discernible
| and will have something to look up.
| [deleted]
| moralestapia wrote:
| OP has a point but the alternatives he provides are a bit worse
| from my perspective.
|
| Also, why not putting the old and new icons side by side? For an
| UX designer that is policing on others, the animated GIF that you
| can't control with a fast transition was a very poor choice.
| mongol wrote:
| Yes that ruins his entire credibility.
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