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After a long day spent doing laundry, you may struggle to find the motivation to fold your clean clothes. But you shouldn’t put off this part of the process; in addition to keeping your garments wrinkle-free, folding your clothes will save you space in your dresser. Even casual items like T-shirts should be neatly folded before going in your drawers. If you know what you're doing, it's easy to fold a basic T-shirt fast.
According to TODAY, one of the simplest tricks for folding T-shirts can be done in less than three seconds. Start by laying the shirt perpendicular to you on a hard, flat surface with the front facing up and the neckline pointing to your right. On the side of the garment farthest from you, identify three points: the midpoint of the shoulder (point B), the middle of the side seam (point A), and the bottom of the shirt (point C). The three points should make a straight line going down the side of the clothing.
To fold the shirt, pinch point B with your right hand and point A with your left hand. Bring point B to join point C, and then uncross your arms to flip the shirt over. Fold the shirt onto itself as you lay it back down on the table. You can see what the process should look like in the video below.
Perfecting the method may take some practice, but once you have it down you should be able to effortlessly fold a T-shirt in seconds. Because the process is so simple, it’s easy to do while focusing on a podcast or television show playing in the background—which should hopefully make the chore more tolerable. And once got T-shirts down, you may want to look into how to more quickly fold pants.
Now that you know how to fold your shirts quickly, find out how much laundry detergent you should use, check out some more tips for making laundry day more efficient, and learn how to pack clothes to minimize wrinkles.
A version of this story ran in 2021; it has been updated for 2023.
This article was originally published on www.mentalfloss.com as How to Fold a T-Shirt in Less Than 3 Seconds.
