Laundry in Switzerland

When we first arrived at our temporary apartment in Geneva, getting used to the washer/dryer situation was big. I'd read that washer/dryers are uncommon in apartments in Switzerland, and that there's usually a common  room in the basement where people do laundry. It was really inconvenient, and involved multiple trips down to the basement over the course of the day, checking whether the machines were finished, whether dryers were free, etc.

Thank goodness in the permanent apartment we're in now, we have our own washer/dryer, no more trips to the basement. That's the good part. The bad part is that it's a combination washer/dryer (it's in the kitchen, under the counter), which is not as effective in washing, and as for drying - forget about it. Unless you put in a much smaller amount of clothing (about half of what you can put in during a wash cycle), there's a scorched smell while running the dryer cycle, which lingers in the clothes, too. Eric claims that it doesn't bother him, so he just puts his clothes in the full wash/dry cycle. But for me and the kids clothes, I use the wash cycle, then hang the clothes up on a folding clothes rack in the kitchen. There's not much humidity in the air here, so they usually dry overnight or during the day. I don't wash clothes as frequently as I used to, because of the extra hassle. Overall, though, I have the routine down now, and it works pretty well.