While spending time in a large city in China, I was surprised to see how many people line-dried their laundry indoors or on covered porches. Even in oppressively humid weather the clothes would still dry, eventually. And in below-freezing temperatures, indoor line-drying is not only necessary but can pleasantly increase the dryness that so often comes with cold.
Following our time in China, I installed hooks in the wall on either side of a room (we used diagonals for extra width). When there's no laundry to dry, the room is open, the hooks' relatively unobtrusive presence notwithstanding. Then, when we do laundry, we string three pre-measured and pre-looped lengths of paracord (ordinarily stored behind the window-curtain) from hook to hook to create the drying lines. And while the laundry obviously takes up indoor space, it does not take up floor space, a crucial consideration when living in a smaller home. (For a time, my wife and I even had our bed under the drying lines, though child play space works well too.) After using this system for two years (in conjunction with three drying racks), we sold our conventional clothes dryer, freeing up even more floor space.
Line drying indoors is also an excellent solution for drying laundry on those rainy summer days!
Costs:
six hooks = ~$6
paracord = ~$8
Profits:
sell old dryer = $100
not using conventional dryer = ~$100/year (factoring in cost of dryer itself and maintenance)
using indoor lines = ~$0.50 per load ($25/year @ one load per week), and a good feeling inside!
My best wishes to you all on your stewardship efforts, particularly as regards drying laundry.
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