I have done the laundry for forty-one years. This is the first laundry basket I have ever written a letter about.
I have done the laundry for forty-one years. This is the first laundry basket I have ever written a letter about.
Six things I have noticed since a Saturday at a cat adoption in Victoria, from a woman whose husband is allergic to the real thing.
Peggy Dalton · Customer · Austin, Texas · 5 min read
Let me tell you who is talking before I tell you anything else. I am Peggy, I am 63, and I live in Austin, Texas, with my husband Frank. Frank has a sister, Bev, who lives down in Victoria, and two or three times a year I drive down and spend a weekend with her. Bev has had cats her whole life. I have not had one in my house in forty-one years of marriage, because Frank only has to look at a cat to start sneezing.
The thing I am writing about is a laundry basket, which I never thought I would write a letter about at my age. It is the Whiskers, from Iris and Nora, a small boutique here in Austin that has been quietly making the ordinary things a little lovelier for a few years now. It is a tall, soft quilted basket covered all the way around in cats. When the boutique asked if they could put my letter up for other women to read, I said yes, on the condition I could be completely honest in it.
I first saw it on a Saturday morning in October, at a cat adoption weekend in the old feed store on the edge of Victoria. Bev had decided her cat needed a little sister, and the rescue ladies had their kennels set up between the bird seed and the stacked feed sacks. At the end of their folding table sat that basket, full of folded fleece blankets, one for every kitten that went home. I watched three different families walk right past the real cats to look at it first, and a little boy stood in front of it counting the cats out loud and lost count at eleven. So while Bev filled in her papers, I asked the woman running the table, plainly. Her name is LaVerne, she is about seventy, and she fosters kittens out in Placedo. She laughed and said, “Honey, half the folks who come to this table come for the basket, and then they meet a kitten.” Read on.
LaVerne let me take a picture of her table before we left. The kittens were all in their kennels, so you will have to take my word that they were cute.
Here is what forty-one years of laundry has taught me. A woman gets offered two kinds of laundry basket. There are the plastic ones, white or beige or that sad pale blue, which crack at the handles the first time you lift them full and sit in the corner looking like something from a hospital. And there are the cloth hampers on a wire frame, which look nice in the picture and fold over in the corner the first time you put a wet towel in them. So you buy the plastic one, you put it behind a door where nobody sees it, and you tell yourself that is just how it goes.
I had never once owned a laundry basket I would have been happy to leave out where company could see it.
The afternoon it came. Frank walked in, saw a crowd of cats on our bed and backed straight out of the room before I could tell him they were quilted.
I ordered the Whiskers that same morning, sitting in Bev’s car in the feed store parking lot while she settled the new kitten in its carrier, and I have used it every day since. Going by those weeks, it comes down to six things, and I will give them to you plainly.
The cats are the thing people stop you for
This is what caught everybody’s eye at the feed store. It is not one or two little cats in a corner. It is a whole crowd of them, standing shoulder to shoulder from the bottom of the basket to the top, every one of them different. There is a big slate gray one with yellow-green eyes up at the top, a mustard yellow one with blue eyes in the middle, a black one with yellow eyes, an orange one, a white one with black stripes and a little lilac one down at the bottom. Every one of them is covered in swirly quilted lines, so the whole thing looks soft and handmade instead of flat. My granddaughter has named eight of them already.
My granddaughter’s favorite is the black one with the yellow eyes. Mine is the gray one at the top who looks like he has heard it all before.
Everybody who comes in my house goes straight to it. My grandkids count the cats every single visit and never get the same number twice.
Delores K., YorktownThe picture goes all the way around
The boutique says the design wraps all the way around, so it looks lovely whichever way you turn it, and that has been my experience. There is no plain back and no wrong side. I have turned it every way in the corner and there are cats on every side of it, so I have quit worrying about which way it faces when I set it down with my arms full. That sounds like a small thing until you have owned a basket with a pretty front and an ugly back.
No front and no back, just cats all the way around. I set it down any old way and it still looks right.
Bonita S., NordheimIt stands up on its own, even empty
This is the one that won me over. The boutique says the basket holds its shape and stands upright on its own, even when it is empty, and it does. It does not slump over in the corner the way my old cloth hamper did, and when it is full to the top with towels it stays standing straight. My second one, the large, lives in the laundry room now and takes a whole load without leaning on anything.
The large one in my laundry nook on a Tuesday. A full load of towels and it is still standing up straight.
I was afraid a soft basket would fall over, but it stands up by itself even when it is empty. Holds a full load of towels for my husband and me.
Ruthann P., GanadoTwo good handles, so one hand will do
There are two tall handles, one on each side, stitched in good and solid. They stand up above the top of the basket, so I can grab both of them in one hand and carry it down the hall with my other hand free for the door. After forty-one years of plastic handles cracking the first time I lifted a full load, I notice handles. These have not given me a moment’s worry.
Both handles in one hand, down the hall to the bedroom. Frank says it is the only cat he will ever carry.
The handles are long enough to grab both at once, and they are stitched on solid. I carry mine up and down the hall every day.
Wilma J., InezSoft, light, and it folds away
The basket is soft to the touch, so it does not bang the paint off the door frames the way my plastic one did, and it is lightweight, so it is no trouble to carry even full. The boutique says it folds easily for storage when you are not using it, and when the family came for a weekend in October and I needed the corner for a cot, I folded it flat and slid it onto the shelf in the linen closet in about two seconds.
So soft and light. When my sister visits I fold it up and put it in the closet, and it pops right back up when she goes home.
Margie T., TelfernerThree sizes, and over forty designs
It comes in three sizes. The small is 14 by 18 inches and the boutique suggests it for bathrooms and kids’ rooms. The medium is 16 by 22 inches, for bedrooms and laundry rooms. The large is 20 by 28 inches, for the family laundry or for linens. My first one was the medium, and it sits in the sunroom holding the throw blankets, where the afternoon light comes in and the cats look like they are sunning themselves. I have since gone back for a large one for the laundry room, the same as LaVerne, who has three. And if cats are not your thing, there are over forty other designs, from honeybees and hummingbirds to sheep and sunflowers.
The medium in the sunroom, holding the throws for when the evenings turn cool. The only cats allowed in this house.
Bought the medium for my bedroom and liked it so much I went back for a small one for the guest bathroom. Same cats, two sizes.
Juanita R., MeyersvilleThe Whiskers, against the baskets I used to own
You can keep buying the plastic one and hiding it behind the door, like I did for forty-one years. Here is the difference, laid out plainly.
Cracks at the handles under a full load
Hard edges that knock the paint off
White, beige or pale blue, every time
Hidden behind a door when company comes
Takes up the same room empty or full
Two tall handles, stitched on solid
Soft, light and easy on the door frames
A whole crowd of cats all the way around
Pretty enough to leave out in any room
Folds flat when you need the space
About the price
The medium Whiskers is $59.95. It was $120.00. The small is $54.95 and the large is $69.95. I will be honest, when I saw that I read the whole page twice looking for the catch. I have not found one. It came with free shipping, it was the basket in the pictures, and it has been standing in my sunroom since the day it came. So has the large one in the laundry room.
I will pass on what the boutique told me, which is that they are running a fall sale to make room, and the most popular designs go first. Their words, not mine. What I can tell you from my side is that I have paid good money for plastic hampers that cracked in a year, so $59.95 for a basket I am happy to leave out where company can see it was an easy yes.
And I do not trust perfect scores, so I read the reviews before I ordered. Just over three hundred of them, sitting at 4.2 stars, which sounded like real women rather than robots. The same six things I have just walked you through come up in them, over and over, in other women’s words.
If you love cats, or you love somebody who does, or you would just like one corner of the house to make you smile on laundry day, this is where I would start. Take a look before the size you want sells through, because once this stock is gone, it is gone. And if you are ever at an adoption weekend down in the Golden Crescent and you see a basket full of quilted cats at the end of a folding table, go and say hello to LaVerne. Tell her Peggy sent you. Frank is still sneezing at Bev’s new kitten, but he has not sneezed once at mine.
Peggy
THE WHISKERS LAUNDRY BASKET
- A whole crowd of quilted cats, all the way around
- Stands up on its own, even empty
- Two tall stitched handles
- Soft, lightweight and folds flat for storage
- Small 14 x 18 in, Medium 16 x 22 in, Large 20 x 28 in
- Free shipping
Fall sale on now, half off, from $54.95. Once this stock is gone, it is gone.