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The Towel-Off

Towel Usage Patterns: A Personal Study

April 12, 2008

I wonder if there are categorizable styles for toweling-off.

Every time I exit a shower, bath, or pool, I dry myself off in a consistent, particular manner.

How did this come about? Do other people use their towels in as a consistent manner as I do? I hope so, because then we can compare towel-usage with heat maps.

I regularly use three sizes of towels: a bath sheet (60” × 35”), a bath towel (52” × 27”) and a hand towel (30” × 16”). I was curious not only how I was using the towel, but if changing towel size changed the usage pattern. So, I took three showers and dried myself off once with each towel.

The darker areas indicate higher use. The patterns represent both sides of the towel, in aggregate.

Bath Sheet (60” × 35”)

Bath Sheet Usage

Bath Towel (52” × 27”)

Bath Towel Usage

Hand Towel (30” × 16”)

Hand Towel Usage

From the maps, we can see I’m a very symmetric towel user, with a focus on the center. I also tend not to evenly utilize my towel’s drying power.

Perhaps I can optimize.


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