In my article on line-drying laundry, I verbally described these handy clothesline hangers that can be made out of scrap lumber and installed in any place that has exposed rafters/joists in the ceiling.  I finally decided to share some photos of them, since this is the kind of thing that really is easier to understand if you can see what I’m talking about–particularly if you never saw one before.  (I am sorry about the poor lighting–our basement is dim, and I made this post on a sudden inspiration, using my iPad which has no flash–but I think they’re better than no photos at all!)

The way to make these is to

• get two boards at least 6″ wide and 3/4″ thick
• use a wide drill bit to cut a half-circular notch into each side at least 1″ away from the end. If you don’t have a drill, you could cut rectangular or triangular notches with a saw.
• nail or screw the other end to the ceiling joist such that the two boards are 6-12 feet apart
• tie the clothesline in a loop through both notches of both boards. This creates two parallel clotheslines several inches apart.

If there’s space, you can hang a third board another 6-12 feet away and run another line around that one and the middle one.  The second photo above shows a middle board with clotheslines running in both directions.  It’s also possible to extend one loop of clothesline perpendicular to the board and another at an angle (45 degrees or less) so that your clotheslines form a V.

Daniel made these when we moved into our house 10 years ago.  They have needed no maintenance except for tightening the screws once when we noticed that the boards had begun to wobble.  The apartment building where we previously lived had clothesline hangers like these already installed–they appeared to be many decades old but were holding up just fine.

We have 5 hangers holding clotheslines in a V, for a total of 8 sections of line, each about 10 feet long.  This is enough hanging space for 2 huge loads of laundry, or 3 loads if many of the items can go on hangers.

These clothesline hangers work for me!  Visit Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways for more ideas for saving money and resources.  Visit Your Green Resource and Small Footprint Friday for more Earth-friendly ideas.

Please let me know if the photos need improvement–and tell me what’s unclear about them, what you can’t figure out from seeing them–I could try again!

(I apologize to my subscribers who received notification of an untitled post and, if you viewed it while it was still up, found that it contained only these photos with no explanation.  I loaded the photos via the WordPress app for iPad, and then my only choices were “publish” or “cancel” and it was time to walk my kid to school, so I was out of time to figure out how to save the post as a draft!  Sorry for the confusion.)