laundry
Americannoun
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articles of clothing, linens, etc., that have been or are to be washed.
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a business establishment where clothes, linens, etc., are laundered.
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a room or area, as in a home or apartment building, reserved for doing the family wash.
noun
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a place where clothes and linen are washed and ironed
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the clothes or linen washed and ironed
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the act of laundering
Etymology
Origin of laundry
1350–1400; Middle English lavandrie < Middle French lavanderie. See launder, -y 3
Explanation
Laundry refers to the clothes and bedding that you can wash in your washing machine or at the laundromat. Nothing smells quite as good as clean laundry. When you do your laundry, you wash your dirty clothes, as well as any towels, sheets, and other linens that could use a wash too. A laundry room is the place in an apartment building, business, or dormitory where there are washers and dryers. Sometimes people send their laundry out to a commercial laundry, where they pay someone else to wash their things. Laundry has a Latin root, lavare, "to wash."
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Murrell's embezzlement began with the purchase of two Ali Baba laundry baskets from Amazon in August 2010 - just one month after his wedding to Nicola Sturgeon.
From BBC • Jun. 1, 2026
Some are paying gig workers to record themselves cooking dinner and doing laundry.
From Los Angeles Times • May 31, 2026
"I've already heard of Ebola and it's a disease that scares me a lot," Mapenzi said as she washed her laundry in a basin on the ground.
From Barron's • May 29, 2026
And on the USS Gerald R. Ford, a $13 billion warship that limped off the line for a week of repairs after its laundry room caught fire.
From MarketWatch • May 21, 2026
Nearby on the floor a green plastic laundry basket held clean laundry inside.
From "Caterpillar Summer" by Gillian McDunn
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
