Denmark loves their 'wet' bathrooms in hotels, no shower door and a drain in the center of the room. I spent a lot of time in CPH and would stay at the Marriott because it was one of the few with American style bathrooms.
It's to save money and labor time so housekeeping can just mop it all down easier and faster without having to clean a separate bathtub and no having to clean any shower doors.
I've never really run into capacity problems with European washing machines, but the run times are definitely real. Most of them have a well-hidden faster mode. Still not as fast as a US machine on fast mode, but not the mandatory-default-by-law three-hour program.
Which would be even longer than 3h if some EU bureaucrat didn't realize that making the default unacceptably long for everyone will result in nobody using it.
My shiny new (2025) Bosch washing machine has a big button on the front which switches from the default 3 hour programme (for 40 degree wash) to 1hr 30m. Like, it's not very _well_ hidden :)
Interestingly, the 3 hour programme isn't really a 3 hour programme. If you use it, the timer will generally start at 3 hours and drop to an hour or so after 20 minutes. I have no idea what the heuristic is, and the manual is silent on the matter.
Isn’t this mostly drying time and the fact that hardly any driers in Europe are vented (so either heat pump based or condensation)? Or is this the uses less water type washing machines? Europe tends to have higher rates on water and electricity to make efficiency worth while.
My Bosch dishwasher takes 3 hours I guess due to efficiency, it seems reasonable. I didn’t go with a European washer dryer combo though (my laundry room has a vent and I’ve heard that heat pump tech still isn’t good enough).
> my laundry room has a vent and I’ve heard that heat pump tech still isn’t good enough
Heat pump dryers are in a slightly weird place in that they're boring old tech in Europe (they've been common for over a decade), and exciting new tech in the US. This means that dryers made for US preferences (physically larger, either three phase or <1500W, etc) are generally first or second models (and thus unreliable) while those made for European preferences are mature designs (and thus reliable).
I thought Europe used condensation and heat pump tech was still a new thing? Ok, 1997 with wide adoption around 2007 according to Google. I really wanted to give it a try, but with a vent right there it just didn’t seem worth it.
Really depends on how expensive your electricity is; a modern heat pump dryer consumes about 1kWh to dry an 8kg load, vs 2-3kWh for either vented or conventional condenser. Though, also depends on what's available to you and at what cost; my impression is that decent heat pump dryers are still very expensive in the US. My fairly high end Bosch one cost about 550eur this year; looking at Bosch's US website the roughly equivalent US model seems to cost $1500, somehow. That's around what they cost here 10-15 years ago.
The other advantage of heat pump dryers is that they operate at lower temperatures than the other types (so damage clothes less); on the negative side, they're slower.
Electricity is cheap here, 12 cents/KwH. I more liked the not ruining clothes aspect and not using the vent means I can get the unit closer to the wall. But I was worried about the smell complaints, my wife is really strict on that, also we have a combo so we can’t pipeline loads anymore. The drawback is that only Samsung makes a vented combo, an Samsung doesn’t have the best reputation. Heat pump was cheaper than vented in a combo at least, but only by 1-2 hundred bucks.
Ah, right. After having had a washer-dryer for about 15 years (they're very common in apartments and small houses in Ireland), would never have one again; when the existing one finally died I replaced with a separate washer and dryer.
I'm somewhat surprised anyone makes a vented washer-dryer at all.
I really like the extra space and not needing to transfer clothes when drying. To each their own though. Only Samsung is making a vented combo so far, and it’s a beast to install and drag up three stories of stairs.
Enough space for me, but you are right stacking would provide similar benefits. Don’t undervalue not needing to transfer clothes to your drier, and you never have to worry about mold and mildew in your washer.
No, this is just about washing machines, not washer-dryers or doing both in sequence.
Due to ecodesign legislation, I would assume that all machines that can be legally sold in the EU would count as "uses less water" in the US.
The dishwashers are another can of worms. My last one had an EU and a non-EU program, and you quickly learned to pick the "non-efficient" one if you actually wanted clean dishes.
My experience with dishwashers is that there are bad and good ones regardless of country. I had terrible and great dishwashers in the US, Australia, and Europe (basically in all countries there). The same with washing machines.
EU ecodesign rules require washing machines to meet certain low energy/water consumption standards in the "default" program. Washing machine designers implement this by making these programs ridiculously long. The EU has now capped them at 3h because they realized that if these programs grow even longer nobody will use them.
Even regular programs in front-loading machines (at least in the European countries I've been to, these make up the absolute vast majority of machines) are longer than typical top loaders. Top loaders are faster but put more wear on the clothes and use more energy and water. A regular, "non-EU" cycle will typically take around 2h. The EU one will typically max out the 3h limit.
> Denmark loves their 'wet' bathrooms in hotels, no shower door and a drain in the center of the room.
If you're renting an apartment in Shanghai, a cheap one will have a door to the bathroom, but the shower won't be a separate fixture. The entire bathroom functions as the shower (the hose or fixed piping is mounted on a wall), and there's a drain in the floor.
A more recent apartment will have a shower installation that is, say, separate from the toilet.
Higher end apartments will. Even newer apartments in Beijing will have wet rooms at some price point. Remember that the apartments are built in China unrenovated, and even new owners of second-hand properties are expected to redo everything from a concrete box, so it is 100% up to the landlord/owner on how the bathroom is done, and I’ve seen it done many many different ways.
I’ve lived in a newish apartment where the wet room drain was in the center. It didn’t seem weird at all. There wasn’t much separation between the shower and toilet and sink, though.
