Washread: Laundry Care Labels

You buy a wool blazer, check the care tag, and find six tiny shapes and not a single word. Washread turns those laundry care symbols into plain-English washing, drying, and ironing instructions, so you know how to clean something without guessing or searching the web.

The symbols come from an international standard: a washtub for machine wash, a triangle for bleaching, a square for drying, a circle for professional care, an iron for ironing. Small marks change their meaning, like dots for temperature or a bar for a gentler cycle. Open the library, tap the symbols printed on your tag, and Washread assembles a care card that reads in clear clauses such as machine wash cold, do not bleach, tumble dry low. Save it with a label like blue cashmere sweater to re-check next laundry day.

If you would rather not hunt through the library, point the camera at the tag and Washread reads any printed text, such as a temperature, as a hint to confirm, though the symbols you tap stay the source of truth. You can switch between Celsius and Fahrenheit and between regional presets.

It is a single-purpose utility that works entirely on your device, with no account, no ads, no tracking, and nothing about your tags ever leaving your phone.