Why We Don't Make Thick Towels?
Lightweight Towels vs Thick Towels: What’s Better?
If you grew up in the U.S. or most of Western Europe, you probably think a good towel should be thick. Plush. Heavy in your hands. The kind that feels luxurious when you wrap it around yourself after a shower, like you're at a spa.
That's what we've been taught a towel should be. Hotels reinforce it. Department stores stock entire aisles of them. And for a long time, we didn't question it.
But here's the thing: most of the world doesn't use towels like that.
In Turkey, in Greece, in much of the Mediterranean and the Middle East, towels are thin. Flat-woven. Light enough to fold into a small square and tuck into a bag. And they've been made this way for centuries — not because people didn't know how to make thick towels, but because thin ones work better.
We didn't understand this at first either. But once we started using Turkish towels, we couldn't go back.
The Problem with Thick Towels
A thick, plush terry towel feels great the first time you use it. Soft, absorbent, cozy. But live with it for a while and the cracks start to show.
It takes forever to dry. If you hang it in a bathroom without great ventilation, it's still damp the next morning. Sometimes the next evening. And damp towels start to smell. Not immediately, but over time they develop that musty, mildew-y odor that no amount of washing seems to fully remove.
They're also heavy when wet, which makes them annoying to travel with. If you've ever packed a beach bag with a couple of thick towels, a change of clothes, and some sunscreen, you know the weight adds up fast. And if those towels get wet? Forget it.
And then there's the drying time after you wash them. A thick towel takes up half the dryer and needs two cycles to fully dry. Or if you line-dry, it's hanging there for a day and a half, stiff as cardboard until you soften it up again.
None of this makes thick towels bad. They do what they're designed to do. But they come with trade-offs that we've just accepted as normal because we didn't know there was another option.
How Turkish Towels Are Different
Turkish towels — the traditional kind woven for use in hammams — use a completely different approach.
Instead of the looped terry pile that makes Western towels thick, Turkish towels are woven flat. The technique is closer to weaving fabric than creating the sponge-like texture of terry cloth. The result is a towel that's thin, tight, and breathable.
At first, this feels counterintuitive. How can something so thin be absorbent?
But absorbency isn't about thickness — it's about surface area and how the fibers pull moisture away from your skin. A flat-woven towel has more direct contact with your body, which means it actually dries you off just as well as a thick one. Sometimes better, because there's no bulky pile getting in the way.
And because the weave is open and breathable, the towel dries fast. Hang it up after a shower and it's usually dry within a few hours. Sometimes by the next morning, even in a humid bathroom. This isn't a small thing — it's the reason these towels don't develop that damp-towel smell. They don't stay wet long enough.
What This Means in Practice
We started using Turkish towels because we liked the idea of them — lightweight, travel-friendly, a little different. But we kept using them because they just worked better.
They take up less space in the linen closet. They're easier to pack for trips. They're lighter to carry when wet. They dry faster after washing, which means less time in the dryer and less energy used.
And they get softer over time instead of stiffer. This is one of the most surprising things about Turkish cotton — the first few washes, the towel feels fine. Not scratchy, but not particularly plush either. Then somewhere around the fifth or sixth wash, it softens. And it keeps softening. A year later, it's the towel you reach for first every time.
Thick terry towels tend to do the opposite. They start soft and break down. The loops start to pull and fray. The texture gets rougher. The absorbency decreases as the fibers wear out.
When a Thick Towel Makes Sense
Look, we're not saying thick towels are wrong. If you love the feeling of wrapping yourself in something plush and cozy, and you don't mind waiting for it to dry, and you have the space to store bulky linens — go for it.
Some people prefer that. And that's fine.
But if you've ever been frustrated by towels that stay damp, or suitcases that are too heavy, or linen closets that are overstuffed, or laundry that takes forever to dry — Turkish towels solve all of that.
They're not trying to replicate the thick-towel experience. They're offering something different. Lighter, faster, more versatile. A towel that works with your life instead of adding weight to it.
Why We Make What We Make
We sell Turkish towels because we genuinely think they're better for most people, most of the time.
Not better in some abstract, aspirational sense. Better in the practical, everyday sense. They dry faster. They pack smaller. They last longer. They get softer instead of rougher. And they do the job a towel is supposed to do — dry you off — just as well as any thick terry towel we've ever used.
The fact that they've been made this way in Turkey for hundreds of years tells you something. Traditions stick around when they work. And flat-woven towels work.
We're not trying to convert everyone. If you're happy with your thick towels, keep using them. But if you've ever wondered if there's a better way — something that feels less bulky, less damp, less high-maintenance — this is it.
