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Maybe cloth napkins used to be reserved for special occasions like dinner parties or holiday meals. But now, as many households keep an eye on sustainability, reusable napkins have become daily necessities. And using a cloth napkin doesn’t just have to be a duty-bound, environmentally-friendly move—brightly colored or funky-patterned napkins are a fun way to spice up an ordinary weekday lunch at home.

I’d been going through family-size packs of paper napkins my whole life, until the pandemic hit. I found myself confined to a small off-campus apartment, trying desperately to turn my sterile, concrete-floored space into a cozy home. That’s when I made the switch to a lovely blue linen napkin set from Etsy. 

The pandemic made interior designer Victoria Cole change her napkin ways too. Tired of forgetting to order the paper variety online when she wasn’t going to Costco anymore, she bought two sets of 12 white cotton everyday napkins and has been using them ever since. Now cloth napkins are a part of everyday life in Cole’s home—she keeps a stack of them on a sideboard in her breakfast room, and her kids know to grab a set when they go to set the table each night. She likes that this set bleaches well and weren’t too much of an investment for everyday use. And, utility aside, she notes that “it feels more elegant, more intentional, when you sit down and have a cloth napkin as opposed to a paper one.” I agree—my own switch from paper napkins ended up inspiring a nightly ritual. Each night, I started to properly set the table for myself. After a day of virtual college classes, this little calming practice allowed me to transform the dining table from a multipurpose chaos surface into a special space for a meal. Thankfully, my life and apartment look different than they did in fall of 2020, but my linen napkins are here to stay. 

Switching to cloth napkins may seem simple enough, but if you’re going to truly use them every day, it’s important to make a practical choice. And there are actually a lot of questions to consider. So many cloth napkins are prone to wrinkling—and you don’t want to have to iron them daily. And, by the way, how often should you wash your cloth napkins? And how? 

Read on for more information about the benefits of making the switch, answers to all of these burning questions, and some of our top picks for napkins that will transform your tablescape, no matter your household size or budget.

There’s no hard-and-fast rule here. In my house, the general rule is that lightly used napkins get folded and draped over each person’s chair, to be used again—*by that same person—*at the next meal. If a napkin wasn’t used at all—that is, it stayed folded neatly on someone’s lap or next to their plate—we’ll consider it as good as new. On the flip side, if we’re eating a feast of barbecued ribs, you’d better believe those sauce-soiled napkins are headed straight to the wash.

In Cole’s house, the breakfast table is also her kids’ homework table, the arts and crafts station, and a catchall for packages and bags throughout the day. To avoid extra clutter—and because her kids tend to really use the napkins to their full potential—napkins in Cole’s house last only one use. Cole notes that she makes sure her napkins don’t add much to her water usage or chore time by incorporating them into loads of laundry she’s already doing.

She’s a staunch advocate for making cloth napkins (and home decor in general) work for your lifestyle. If laundry is not a daily occurrence in your household, opt for napkins that have more polyester in the blend. In general, more polyester translates to more stain resistance, which makes for napkins that are built to last.

Cole sprays all of her napkins with stain remover after a meal as needed, and, as noted above, sticks to a white set so that she can easily bleach them if required. In general, she suggests choosing relatively inexpensive napkins that you needn’t be too precious with—they’re tools for wiping up messes, after all.

I run my linen set on a normal wash and dry cycle, which results in some (in my opinion, charming) crinkling post-dry. If I have company coming over, I’ll (sometimes, when I’m not busy hovering over the stove) run an iron over them for a more elegant look. If crinkles aren’t your thing, Cole recommends opting for cotton or cotton-blend napkins and hanging them to dry after washing.

Cloth napkins do you no good if they’re all in the hamper, so the answer to this question depends on how often you wash your napkins. Because she washes them after each use, Cole has six sets of everyday napkins for each member of her family, 24 napkins total. If you’re planning to try the cloth napkin life but don’t envision yourself using and washing them every day, a good rule of thumb is to buy three sets of napkins per household member. You also want to make sure that you have a total amount of napkins that amounts to the maximum number of people you could have over for dinner. For my household of two, that means six napkins: three each for my roommate and me. That total of six is realistically the maximum number of people we could have over for a seated dinner (crowded around our Facebook Marketplace-d Ikea table and eating off of our mismatched plates).

In my own home, I’ve opted for square-shaped, single-color styles that can easily be mixed and matched. My napkins are linen, and I lean into the wrinkled look they take on when they’re machine dried. Cole likes a cotton or cotton-poly blend, because she feels they clean well, wrinkle less, and are inexpensive enough that she can replace them when she needs to. Those old napkins? They get repurposed as cleaning rags.

Since introducing cloth napkins into her everyday rotation, Cole has expanded her collection to include a range of sets that fit her various needs: There’s a set she keeps for meals outdoors, a set in complementary pastel colors that she uses for more formal occasions, a few novelty sets, and, of course, those everyday white napkins. Of all of these sets, only her lobster napkins (a vintage find) are treated with particular care. The rest fall into that camp of inexpensive things that actually look nice, allowing Cole to use them often and worry-free. Cole’s design philosophy, in the realm of napkins and beyond, is simple: “If it works for you, then there’s no right or wrong…. The things you add to your house shouldn’t hinder you, they should help you in every way possible.”

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