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Comment by pablobaz | Hacker News Reader

My preferred technique is to also start with the cover inside out. Then put your hands inside the cyber into its corners. Then grasp two corners of the duvet through the fabric. A bit of shaking to turn the cover the right way out and you are done.

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What other way is there? This is how I learned it from my mom and have done it ever since.

Edit: I guess there's this rolling method, which seems a lot more convoluted based on the videos.

IME lots of people just try stuff the duvet in and then shake it to get it in the right place.

Someone should write a book called Household Chores for Hackers: The algorithms your mother took for granted and forgot to teach you.

"Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House" is quite good:

https://www.amazon.com/Home-Comforts-Science-Keeping-House/d...

Grab any 1950's "how to be a good housewife" book, use a bit of scripting to replace "housewife" with "housekeeper" and "husband" with "partner", and republish.

I never had a duvet until the late 70's. I had heard that Swedes slept under duvets, but we had to settle for blankets and sheets. I ws envious! Well, we did have what we called "eiderdowns", which were like duvet inners, but lined in a heavy satin. But they were used as throws for extreme weather; you still slept between sheets and blankets.

I think my parents' generation viewed duvets as unacceptably decadent, and thought all children should learn to fold hospital corners[0] to build character.

[0] https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Hospital-Corner

I must also add that duvets were created for cold rooms and they're great for that: feeling so cozy warm when your nose is still chilled... However you get them as only choice in mostly any hotel nowadays, which also heat the rooms at 22C or more, so sweating and a general sleeping discomfort is guaranteed. Or shortly put: I hate you hotels with duvets.

Don’t use the entire thing and you can sleep comfortably.

Also, many rooms let you get the temperature to ~15C.

The gender-neutral term I’ve seen (for eg an occupation for life insurance) is ‘houseperson’ which I always found pretty funny.

Oh god why not just stay at home partner?

The book “Algorithms to live by” comes close

Would also highly recommend! It's not quite exactly a practical handbook, and doesn't cover topics such as duvet cover changing, but it is considerably more relevant than most popular science/mathematics books. The very first chapter, for instance, covers the idea of explore/exploit choices, and does so in a way that is both general enough to be genuinely useful in everyday life (at least at a conceptual level) and mathematically rigorous enough not to throw you off should you want to read further.

Or even ... life hacks.

</ducks>

I taught my mother how to fold a fitted sheet. A girlfriend taught me and I was floored at how elegant it is. Prior to that, they just made me angry and ended up in the closet in a wad.

Please share!

Video is probably actually appropriate for this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6Iqn6mdmSs

In which of the 21 minutes of tech talk does this person actually fold a sheet?

Here is a video of someone actually folding the sheet as the parent requested: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ckTCocBCUN4

What does the page on folding fitted sheets say?

Abandon all hope ye who enter here.

Tuck the corners into each other, fold up the rectangle.

I’ve tried that many times and it always ends in a wadded up ball of sheet, and tears.

I would buy it.

folds sheets in the dark

That's a dark pattern

This is what I do. I take a corner of the inner and stuff it into the outer until I find the corner of the outer. Then I try to keep those two corners in place while I do the same with the other corner. Then I grab both corners from the outside and do a lot of vigourous shaking until everything lines up. It takes ages and doesn't always work. I think I will try starting inside out from now on.

IME neither inside out nor the method you describe work well and both are tedious. Inside out does not work well, because the cover doesn't obey gravity and refuses to fall down to cover the duvet completely. It is a secret power of bed sheet covers. That, or it has to do with other things like friction.

I do a modified version: I put all the corners in the right places, then a good shake by holding two adjacent corners straightens everything out. May not work so well for duvets much wider than your arm span.

I do that and while the shaking is unpredictable and often requires doing it from multiple sides, I find it a strong but strangely pleasant exercise for my shoulders.

That is fascinating. Just asked my wife, who's from another continent, she's as flabbergasted as me.

As a kid we didn't have duvets. It was all sheets and blankets. Duvets were a bit new-fangled so it's not surprising the knowledge wasn't passed down.

We always had duvets at home, growing up in the ‘80s. But I do remember staying at my grandparents house was all dusty blankets and bed-bug bites.

The rolling method is really exactly the same thing, but some people find it easier to think about reaching in for the corners after rolling, and you don't need to be tall enough to let it fall down into place (wife is 5'4" and rolls, I'm 6'4" and just reach for the far corners).

The duvet is like a parachute, you don’t need to shake it in from the top you can shake it in like a magician doing the table clearing trick.

If it's the same, then some people here posted really bad videos of it ;)

FWIW, my wife is tiny (160cm) and still does the reverse grip method

If the cover is not already inside out, then grab two duvet corners in on hand and pass to one cover corner (inside the cover ofc.) use your free hand to pinch cover corner and one of the duvet corner from the outside. Now place the remaining corner inside the cover(keep pinching the other corner). Pull your arm out, pinch this corner, shake to align.

I use the rolling method for the joy it brings each time :)

I call this the ghost method, because you look like a ghost with your arms through the inverted duvet cover.

My girlfriend insists that the your head does not go inside. But why would you forgo all that fun?

I do that with my kid. For funsies. Also high in the list: snake bites foot (to put on his tights).

I think this is the official strategy, i've never seen someone using a different one.

I used to do the shove it in and frantically thrash until it take shape. Then I learnt this system and it is much easier. For a king size: maybe just get someone to help.

I googled this when I first moved to a duvet country and adopted this exact method.

Yeah, I don't think there's a need for the roll. You just need to make sure you can hold it high enough in the air to shake the thing without letting the bottom rest on the floor.

I just think of it like a really big pillow case. I put the pillow case on inside out so I do the same for the duvet cover.

I don't remember where I picked this up either, but I do remember it caused an ex girlfriend to get irrationally angry and tell me I was doing it wrong... that's when I knew she wasn't a keeper!

I think it could be useful for shorter people who can't hold it up high enough. I just hold it up and shake it, though.

As a short person, my strategy is to stand on the bed for extra height for this method. Or just be lazy and accept the slightly uneven distribution, which works itself out after the first night anyway.

I’m tall but got super king sheets. I much prefer roll method which is just less faffing around.

Yeah there is no need to have it hanging down, shaking it like a whip has the same effect.

I discovered this method in the early 80s as a kid on French TV.

There was a program with Jacques Martin about "incredible" stuff. I remember a hairdresser who used a flame and J Martin almost agreed to try, another one about the world record in going back and forth through a door.

That one was the world record in how many duvets you can handle in a given time IIRC.

Note that this was 80, 81 or around that. This was the only source for such stuff in France so it was a big show (for children at least)

I kinda miss the curiosity show.

It was a bit more science leaning but got kids to awe just the same way.

That works but it is hard to use that technique on king size duvet. I essentially use the technique described in the article by starting with the cover turned inside out on top of duvet, tying all corners and then reaching through the cover opening for the far side and pulling it in instead of rolling and unrolling.

I always change the sheets in our house because my partner absolutely hates doing it. I recently realised this is because she has dramatically less upper-body strength than me, the "bit of shaking" is pretty exhausting for her with our heavy winter duvet. So this technique could be really useful for people with her build!

I use the same method. Although when reaching into the cover to its corners, I sometimes put my head in too. I stand up like some sort of inverted-duvet covered ghost and give the dog a fright. Then I continue the process again.

Yeah when I read this, I thought the step of tying all the corners seemed more than necessary. You only have to hold two of the corners and pull/shake.

Yeah I find the rolling method is more work than it’s worth when the “grab the corners and shake vigorously” method works just fine.

Shaking is far more exhausting, dusty and not foolproof. Roll method is no brainer, esp on large sheets.

The shaking part requires a lot of upper body strength that not everyone has. I can get a nice whip-snap out of a down comforter on a double bed but not a king. I ended up with a new synthetic comforter on the double and can barely make the far end rustle now because it weighs like 5 times as much.

WTF!? I heard before that putting a cover on a duvet was a thing, a problem, a mystery... are ppl making this up? is this a joke I don't get invert, tie corners together and what not...

my family and everyone i know do it the way @pablobaz describes it. it's simple and effective. change sheets whenever you feel like doing it, because its easy and fast... endof story

I've only ever known cramming it inside and then crawling inside with it to try and get the duvet into place.

I grew up in a family that had (home made!) blankets and quilts, duvets were not a thing until I moved out on my own.

Hard agree. Changing a duvet cover is not hard. Maybe we are just getting stupider as a species.

In terms of cultural knowledge, it does seem like certain things were taken for granted by previous generations and not handed down in ways that younger generations can manage.

You are simply ignorant of how large duvets can get (taller than 99th percentile).

Maybe that is part of my ignorance. I am quite tall, probably in the 97%

King size duvet is 245x210 cm and weights few kilos. No way you can manhandle this.

It's how I do it but we have a very large and heavy duvet; this technique (that my mom showed me once and I then promptly forgot) is a lot less impactful, since the shaking kinda requires you to lift and shake the whole thing.

Here's a video that demonstrates it - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fzNuhgY_9A

this is not the same technique - video involves vigorous shaking of the duvet

I was never taught this, but I ended up "reinventing" it a few decades ago, certainly because this is the most efficient way ? I have always used this technique since.

Yeah, this is exactly how I do it except I don’t even bother to turn anything inside out. Just place the two “far” corners of the inner all the way into the corners of the cover, then grip the corners firmly and shake until everything finds its place. Easy.

The shaking also has the effect of fluffing up the down/feather filling nicely and distributing it evenly, which you should do once in a while if you have a non-synthetic duvet.

The rolling technique described in the article just seems ridiculous, way too much work!

That’s how I learned it from my mama and that’s what ill teach the children.