How to Fold a T-shirt in Two Seconds

Folding laundry is a chore that gobbles up your time. By learning how to fold a T-shirt quickly, you can shave minutes, maybe hours, off this daily chore. Then you may have time to go on that vacation ... and buy another souvenir T-shirt to fold.

Instructions

The Traditional Method

1. Do the math. If you want to fold a T-shirt in two seconds, that's one fold a second.

2. Pick up the T-shirt by the neck with two hands (the front of the shirt should be facing you), and with thumbs on the outer edge of the neck opening at the top of the shirt.

3. Press your three middle fingers (on each hand) on the back of the shirt, and stretch your pinkie fingers out to the edge of the shirt's shoulders. Thumbs should stay in the same position.

4. Flick your wrists inward until your pinkies meet up in the back. This is the first fold.

5. Touch the bottom half of the front of the shirt onto a flat surface, keeping wrists bent inward, and slightly pulling the shirt toward you.

6. Drop your wrists to meet up with the bottom hem of the shirt and let go, all in one fast, fluid motion. This is the second fold.

T-shirt Origami

1. Place your shirt, front side up, on a flat surface sideways in front of you, with the neck opening to the right.

2. Imagine your shirt equally divided into thirds, horizontally.

3. Pinch the shirt, with the left hand, in the middle of the imaginary line farthest away from you.

4. Grab the shirt with your right hand at the top of the shoulders and at a point parallel with your other hand, along that same imaginary horizontal line.

5. Cross your right arm over your left, touching your right hand to the bottom corner of the T-shirt farthest away from you. (All the while, keep your left hand in place)

6. Pick up the corner with your right hand, and swing your right arm back over the left while raising the left hand with the same point still pinched in your fingers. Use a jerking motion to keep the shirt folds tight and crisp.

7. Stretch the shirt between your hands. There's a sleeve hanging out at the bottom. Fold the front of the shirt over that sleeve to create a perfect, store-looking fold.

Tips & Warnings

• Teach this to your children to make laundry more fun.

• With this method, depending on how shirts were put in the washer, you may end up folding a shirt that is inside out. Unless you are picky about seeing the front of your shirt in a drawer, this shouldn't make a difference.

• Don't assume that since you've seen this done quickly on TV and the Internet that it is the quickest way. Sure it looks neat, but the "two-second" gimmick doesn't take into account the time it takes to flatten out the shirt.

Resources

• A product that will do it for you
• See T-shirt origami.