Buying bath towels

Floating out of a warm bath into a soft, thick bath towel can make you feel luxuriously pampered. But in most bathrooms the reality is that we jump out of our tubs and showers only to wrap our shivering bodies in a small, thin, almost water repellent, joke of a towel.

“Who can afford $50 bath towels?” you ask. Don't worry -- it doesn't have to cost you two shivering arms and a leg for good quality towels, if you know the facts on how to buy and care for great towels.

Choosing your towels
All towels are made from varying types or grades of cotton. Some of the more expensive, high quality towels are made from products like Egyptian or Brazilian cotton. But the type of cotton shouldn't be your main concern when buying towels, says Heather Seale, an interior decorating instructor at Bow Valley College in Calgary.

“It's hard to talk about [towels] without feeling and touching them,” Heather says, adding that the best way to judge the quality of a towel is to feel it and look at it. If it has a soft, velvety texture and a bit of weight to it, the quality is good. But if the towel is thin and feels scratchy like canvas, it's low quality and will wear out fast. Next, you should look closely at the fabric. It should be cut or shorn off so the fibres stand up just like the grass on your lawn, not woven into little loops. This makes the towel feel more luxurious. The fabric should also be tightly woven together to give the towel fullness.