Hey so I’m considering upgrading my snuff accessory set, and I’m wondering about buying a handkerchief. The only problem is, I’m worried it will get all soaked in brown on my first blow and then be utterly useless. How easy is it to wash handkerchiefs after you use them? Are they really useful, or more of just a decorative accessory?

Hi, D.S. I’ve only a brief experience thus far, but I find my handkerchiefs to be indispensable. Most of the ones I have my wife got for me before I took up snuff. So, they are white. They most definitely show their use. A darker color would be preferable. I would think a dark brown would be advisable. Mostly, I use mine to remove the excess dusting after using snuff. It only takes a light brush across the nose. It keeps you from looking…unkempt. A good handkerchief will be much easier on your skin that tissue. Bottom line, and for what it’s worth, I would recommend a good handkerchief or 6 because mine have proven extremely useful.

I carry 2 handkerchiefs in my back pockets at all times. That said, I use paper tissues for the vast majority of my nose blowing. But every once in a while, it sure is a godsend to have something in your pocket to wipe away the brown catastrophe that just sneezed out. Especially when you’re out of arm’s reach of those tissues. I consider my hankies an insurance policy. And yes, even the white ones mostly wash clean, but I like my brown ones better.

Thanks for the replies. I guess I’m just worried about the whole idea of washing the handkerchiefs. I mean I blow my nose once, get it all soaked in brown, and then it has to go into the washing machine? Not very useful then. Do people have success just washing out their handkerchiefs in the sink after using them?

i find i get multiple uses out of one, so its not a case of washing after a single blow. if its a heavy amount of mucus im expecting, ill use a sink. as for washing them- i handwash mostly, it lets me scrub them properly. i sometimes run them through the main wash in the machine, but dont think id risk it with a very brown one

I wash mine in the machine in my denim load, with the hope that the denim will beat the heck out of them and soften them up. I’d say it works.

For my snuff taking I get the big blue paisley ones at Target/WalMart, they cost under a dollar and have a lot of blowing and wiping surface area. Snuff expulsion dries pretty quickly and does not seem to show much against the navy blue on subsequent uses and laundering removes the snuff stain completely. I start every day with a fresh hanky.

@DivinusSalviarum yes, they are absolutely indispensable! But you will need several, not one. I think I have about 20. One of the large Bavarian ones will last me a day and then some. The smaller ones are good for a day, and then the really small ones which are actually standard hanky size (about 14 inches square) last me about a half day. To wash, I toss one or two in the bottom of the shower right before I get in to wash myself. At the end of my shower they are pretty much clean. I let them hang in there to dry. The next day when they are dry they are tossed in the regular laundry. This way you don’t get snuffy snotty yuck in your clothes or your washing machine. They always come clean and ready to use again. Over time the white ones do start to get stained and turn yellow-brown, so I prefer to buy darker ones, but I still use all the white ones I acquired in my pre-snuffing days.

I just toss them in the laundry, with a quick spray of prewash

We use the larger ‘snuff hankies’ and bandanas which you can get various places online (cotton bandanas are about £1 on eBay), which are about 20" square; one will last all day generally, or about half a day if I’m enjoying a lot of menthols. LadySnuff and I have about 30 between us, and we plan to get a few more. We save them in a bucket, and then put them together in a main wash with old towels or similar; as long as we don’t overload the machine, they all come out lovely and clean. It does take a few washes for new bandanas to soften up, but they are fab, I don’t use normal hankies at all now. The colours and patterns you can get are good for not making it obvious you have been taking snoot-fulls of snuff all morning!

To wash, I toss one or two in the bottom of the shower right before I get in to wash myself. At the end of my shower they are pretty much clean. I let them hang in there to dry. The next day when they are dry they are tossed in the regular laundry. This way you don’t get snuffy snotty yuck in your clothes or your washing machine. They always come clean and ready to use again.

Loving this pre-wash idea @Xander, I’m going to try it out!

I never had a strategy plan to follow when I started doing this. But this became my routine. Firstly, I have about 12 colored hankies and 12 whites (because the store ran out of colored, but colored are best if you can get them all colored (they camouflage)). The whites I use when I’m home alone and there is no one around to gross out. I use the heck out of them. They become spotted like a cows hide before I flip a side over (folded in three and then again in three) and use it till it all looks like a cows hide and then I throw them in the laundry. I stuff the one Im currently using in between the couch cushions so they are within reach but hidden incase someone comes for a visit. The colored ones I use in public or around my fiance or what have you. I wash the whites (with other white clothes) at 90 degrees (Celsius). It turns out it works. It might even work at 60 or 40, but I don’t know, I just did it at 90 one day, all my whites survived and looked clean, so that’s what I continue to do. They look super white and clean every time. I can barely believe it what with all the brown tobacco staining them. But yeah, it works. The colored ones I wash at 60 with the rest of my clothes. They look super clean as well. Optimally, when i move in with my wife, I would have a laundry bag of its own for my hankies, and wash them on their own. And probably have twice as many hankies as I have now. Its just for my peace of mind. I don’t want my wife to have to rummage through (or even have to see) that brown snotty mess and I optimally don’t want them to be washed with her clothes. PS: At home I use toilet paper or tissues for my hardest nose cleaning blows, just to preserve the hankies a bit longer. I dont bring tissue paper with me outside. So hankies get used up quicker when Im out and about.

I use cheap colored bandanas available at most Walmarts. They cost about a buck and after a couple washes they come up nice and soft. So far even the lighter colored ones don’t seem to be getting any stains,but I do tend to do most of my serious blowing into some tissues or toilet paper so it can just be thrown out. I use the bandans mostly for dusting and the inevitable nose drip that comes from time to time.When one is ready for the washer anyway or Im in a situation where nothing else is readily available I have no problems with using it for a good blow.

I use worn out flannel shirts— soft and absorbent and doesn’t cut up the nose like t shirts do… I usually just rinse them in sink and dry daily. Takes about 10 minutes and I always keep three on me at all times.

I have a few bandanas in rotation but my favorite are these vintage table napkins a friend found and gave to me. They’re super soft and I go through about 2 every day. I’ve just been tossing them in the wash after knocking the dried up snuff off and running them with the regular laundry.

I have about 10 colored hankies, but i would like to have some ten more. I use one and when it’s full, I let it “cool down” before wash. Then when i throw them to laundry, I first scratch all the dry brown tobacco out of the hanky. It is more like shaking and twisting a little than actually scratching. Then i wash them in whatever temperature I am washing at the moment. It doesn’t really matter is it 40 or 60 or even handwash 30. I found the hankies much better than white tissues, which tend to turn disgusting right away and gather all around the house, pockets, car, etc. because I am too lazy to bring them to rubbish bin right after the use.

Although sometimes a white handkerchief is nice if you want your snuff discharge to smile back at you:

So that’s what I will be expecting. hmmmm. I thinking about changing jobs (To become a bin man), but right now I work at a wood mill, and my snot already looks like that. hah.

@Xander close up it looks like a cow skull ,Who knew you could create art with your nose? =))

YES must have the hankies, I have maybe 20. I always dust my nose off after indulging in a pinch. As with people already posted above I learned the dusting the hard way, people giving me strange looks, then seeing one has a brown tash. When I am out for dinner or having a drink with friends the dark hankerchief is ESSENTIAL, so one does not need to explain why the white tissue is now brown, and see people recoiled in horror. However when I can be discreet I just use disposable tissues and then bin them, having said that I could probably make one of my large snuff one’s last the whole day, and indeed have done…When I was courting my now wife I always used coloured hankies to blow my nose, for obvious reasons…Wilson’s used to sell them by the box but I don’t know who stocks them…

@Hoopei I seen some bernard handkerchiefs on mr. snuff

I love those Bernard hankies, they’re nice and big and have pretty patterns.

Speaking of Bernard hankies, I see that the blue Bernard hankie has a cool B symbol on it in the middle. Does anyone know if the black hankie has the same symbol on it?

I don’t see one with a “b” but I see one with a Bavarian crest and in the Bavarian blue & white (weissblau) pattern. I have that one, and I always make sure to take it to Oktoberfest!

I don’t see one with a “b” but I see one with a Bavarian crest and in the Bavarian blue & white (weissblau) pattern. I have that one, and I always make sure to take it to Oktoberfest!

Oh yeah sorry, I didn’t mean B, I meant the fancy crest. Do you know if the black Bernard handkerchief has the same pattern? (The Mr. Snuff picture only shows the corner which shows a black-and-white checker like the blue-and-white checker on the blue, but it doesn’t show the middle of the hankie.)

Yeah, I have that one too. Its actually dark blue not black. Its got the Bavarian checker pattern but not the crest.

I just got the 3 dozen bandannas I ordered online, a dozen each in brown, dark red, and navy. Ran me about $50 shipped. I haven’t used them enough to pass judgment, but I wash them by themselves, with the washer set to “Soak” and “Extra Rinse”, and that seems to work. The bandannas I got are so thin as to be semitransparent, but they air dry in an hour or two after I hang them on every knob in my apartment. Also, I am not frugal in using the bandannas, switching to new ones frequently. A few years back I bought 25 lbs of white cotton rags online, and use them for everything except toilet paper and bath towels, washing a load of them a week. The rags were cheap enough to throw out occasionally, and now any old or ripped clothes get turned into more rags. Looking to switch to bandannas only for my nose now, as the snuff really stains those rags.

I also use bandannas and large spotted handkerchiefs. I have about two dozen of them, and the used ones go in a bag until I’m starting to run out, then into the washing machine by themselves. Cotton cycle at 60 degrees Centigrade works fine - just remember to unfold them before you put them in the machine.

I don’t see the need to wash hankierchifs separately from the rest of my wash. I get far more disgusting stuff on my clothes in an average day’s scrabble around town. I’d probably feel different if it was someone else’s snot, but it’s not, it’s mine.

Several years ago I was in one of those big craft stores with my wife (Hobby Lobby, Michael’s, JoAnn’s, etc) and they sold bandanas in every color of the rainbow. I grabbed all of the brown ones they had. Perfect. They are starting to get a little worn and thin now, so I’m on the hunt again. Seeing what color the water immediately turned when I washed them convinced me to always hand wash them and hang them up to dry.

@Java I bought my bandannas/handkerchiefs here ( http://www.wholesaleforeveryone.com/category/bandanas-paisley-22-dozen.html ). I think 3 dozen of the 22" square ones ran me ~$50 shipped after a coupon code I found with Google. May not be much cheaper than some retail stores, but it worked and was worth avoiding another errand. Handkerchiefs are decent but not great quality, with some strings starting to come loose after only 1 or 2 washings despite stitched edges, and are so thin as to be slightly transparent, but I suspect that most handkerchiefs/bandannas sold in the world come out of only a only or two factories in China anyway… Next time I will probably try to order some smaller handkerchiefs. The 22" square ones are a bit big for pocket use when balled up.

Hello. This is a subject near and dear to me, as you will soon see. While I have only recently taken to nasal snuff, I have since boyhood carried two handkerchiefs at all times. It was a trait instilled in my by my Grampa - and one with reason. In my back pocket I carry what most would call a bandanna, usually in blue or some other dark color. This is the wipe your nose, buff your shoe, wipe the sweat from your brow, make a sling for a sprained arm bandanna, and it sees the most use. I have at this point likely 4 or 5 dozen, and I collect the soiled one each day in a small basket, which when once filled they are removed to the sink and soaked in hot water with suds from my shaving soap , then wrung out and laundered with my denims. In my left pocket however I carry a linen or cotton handkerchief, which I am particular in the pressing of, in case I need one to offer someone else. The fairer sex , by the way, are suckers for that old school charm even in this most modern of ages, when a gentleman’s linen is offered when upset or a drink is spilled upon them. ( And gentlemen, once proffered, never ask for it’s return. You just might find it returned later , in a very appreciative manner ). These I also collect, and since they are by their nature not soiled just rumpled I toss them in with the wife’s dedicates, to be pressed and cycled through again. The HP

Brown hankies are hard to find in the UK - so a dozen cheap white ones from eBay and a tube of brown fabric dye solves that one. For washing, a pre-soak in the sink with detergent to remove the slime and vegetable matter then in the machine with the regular laundry works for me.

Brown hankies are hard to find in the UK - so a dozen cheap white ones from eBay and a tube of brown fabric dye solves that one. For washing, a pre-soak in the sink with detergent to remove the slime and vegetable matter then in the machine with the regular laundry works for me.

In my part of the US we have a chain of stores called Dollar General - I have found the have a decent amount of dark bandannas ( blue, black, dark green, camo, etc etc ) for an average price of $1 each …

For my two “handkerchiefs” I just took an old dark green cotton t-shirt and cut 2 pieces from it. Both pieces are the same size as the 1 white hankie I have. I didn’t want to use the white one. As for washing them, I only use them to dust off my nose after snuffing and rarely blow my nose into them. I use tissue or paper towels to blow into so when I wash my green t-shirt hankies they’re never really that bad so I just throw them in the washer. I would say even the dirtiest hankie should be fine to just throw in the washer because recently I got bicycle chain grease all over a pair of athletic shorts of mine and I threw those in with a load of laundry that had white shirts and everything was fine. If black grease doesn’t spread onto other clothes or mess anything up I would say a snuff/mucus covered hankie would be fine.

Oh a handerchief is utmost important if you are an all day snuffer. Its more of a necessity than an accessory. I usually use soft cotton handkerchiefs (as large as are available) which are dark in color. They can be washed in hot (yes, hot, not warm) water with a mild detergent and become softer on the use with each wash. Ideal for anyone who uses snuff.

I have white handkerchiefs.  My average is 5 a day.  I sometimes wonder if I’m doing something wrong, but I am at it pretty much all day

I didn’t know about these techniques for washing.  Once I’ve accumulated a lot of these things, I’ll have to try some of them

Cheers

Is any handkerchief appropriate to use for snuff, or are there snuff specific handkerchiefs? I got some handkerchiefs from Amazon.

I bought a cheapo 25 pack on ebay a few years back. They’re rough, but improved with washing over the years. However, since I’m working from home, I’ve been favoring a thick jersey sheet pillow case. (no shame) It’s soft and catches all the errant snuff. Too bad even I’M not shameless enough to bring it out in public.   :))

@MrManGuy as long as it’s soft you’re good, anything cotton. I prefer bandanas, the paisley pattern hides the massive brown snot spots.

Black bandannas for me. I wash them in the bath and then put them into the washing machine,

For outside, for better appearance sake i have brown handkerchiefs, cotton, and i find they wash just fine with other coloured laundry, but they’re less absorbent than my next 2 choices.

But at home, i use brown cotton teatowels ( less than a tenner on well known site beginning with A for 6), and any colour microfibre cloths ( lovely and soft, similar price same site). Again, they wash just fine with coloured laundry in the machine. 

My Grandmother used to stock me up with hankies as a child. I remember she would boil them in a large pan probably with some hand washing powder or other linen detergent of yesteryear.

Welcome to the forum Dunravin!
It’s Elephant brand bandanas for my handkerchiefs. They aren’t perfect but they work fine.

I wash these, really filthy, using auto-soak setting and they come out perfectly clean. If I don’t use auto-soak they dont get clean. It’s necessary to let the detergent surfactants work for awhile.