How Does a Blind Person Get Ready

Let’s start with doing laundry and then we will go onto wearing those clothes. Washing machines and dryers don’t normally come with braille on them. So how does a blind person do their laundry? Well here is how we do it at my house!

We have taken the washer dial that turns for the settings and added a dot on the arrow. And a dot where the longest clean cycle starts and a dot of sticky paint on the second setting. The first three knobs are pretty easy: the size of the load, the water temperature and fabric softener.

On the dryer we have a foam triangle on the arrow and a foam X on the long cycle. Some dryers we have had a dot oh the arrow and Dymo tape above the dryer settings. Below is what a friend with low vision has done with a black sharpie to mark her washer and dryer

Now that we have washed and dried our laundry we hang it up or fold it. Just like everyone else. So how does a blind person know what to wear?

There are mainly three methods. One way is they learn by the feel of the clothes what color it is and what it goes together. Most blind people will wear basic color skirts/pants to keep things simple.

The second way is to put braille tags in your clothes. These can be bought online and just need someone who can sew on a button to put them on the clothes. They come with a number of colors. And these metal tags have print and braille usually. There is one place that has only braille on the tags and its usually just one or two letters, but it comes with a guide that has the braille dots and what color it stands for.

The third way is by using a color identifier. The can be bought starting at around $100. However, there are now apps that do just as good of a job telling you the color of your clothes.These apps include: Color Grab (for Android); Swatches: Live Color Picker (Iphone); Examine Clothes Color (Iphone). For more a extensive list check out Techigem’s top 10 list of color identifier apps for 2019. https://techigem.com/color-identifier-apps/

Enjoy this video about how my Mom picks out her clothes using the tags. I will post links to where to find the laundry tags at the end of this article.