When I send off my face masks to their owners I always include care instructions:

“To wash your mask, it is best to remove the nose wire, wash at 40ºC with a non-bio, fragrance free detergent (just add it to your regular clothes wash), pull into shape, line dry and iron on moderately hot. Please don’t iron the elastic.”

I always use fragrance free detergent and let the fresh air do the rest, but realise that a lot of people don’t. As face masks are worn so close to the skin I just think it makes sense to reduce the number of unnecessary chemicals that we breathe in.

I know there is a bit of an obsession out there with washing face masks at a higher temperature. I’ll probably get shouted down here but I don’t necessarily think that we need to do this (and I could be wrong, of course), for the following reasons:

(1) I don’t wash my hands at 60ºC, and that is supposed to be sufficient to wash away the virus.

(2) Washing your hands for 20 seconds with soap is supposed to be sufficient, so why not washing your clothes at the same temperature for hours in the washing machine, with soap and several rinses?

(3) I never wash anything at 60 degrees or higher (well maybe once a year), even nappies I only ever washed at 40ºC. Are people really going to run the washing machine for a couple of face masks? That would cost a fortune (not to mention the environmental damage) and may actually make you reluctant to wash them when you need to!. Much easier just to throw it in with the rest of your clothes. Having a big family I wash almost every day, but in reality a lot of people probably hand wash their masks (which is fine). If you want to make sure you kill any viruses, I think ironing is perfectly adequate, and it makes the mask look nicer too. But hey, do shout me down if you want to and give your reasons, I’m always happy to learn, and have been known to change my mind about things, sometimes…

Somebody commented that drying your face mask outside could pick up pollen. Good Point! If you have a tendency to hayfever it is probably better to dry it inside as it’s something being worn closely to your face.(but not in the tumble drier, the synthetic interlining would not take to that very well!).

I am currently working on a quadruple layer face mask design which has two layers of a non-woven synthetic fabric in the middle and is washable at higher temperatures for those who want to. I still won’t be doing it mind.