The Matchbox Dare: Dry Your Hands in the ‘Airblade’
I’ve taken a lot of pictures in restaurants, but over the years, I’ve never snapped one in a restaurant’s bathroom—until this past weekend, when I stopped at the new Matchbox in Barracks Row. After washing my hands, I turned to look for a paper towel. Not finding one, I looked for a hand dryer. I didn’t see one of those either. Then I spotted this thing, at knee level, that looks like a device for severing your hands. It didn’t help that the contraption is called the Dyson Airblade, or that when you stick your hands into the thing, you feel a sharp prick on your wrist from the high-speed air flow. The Airblade is not a classic warm-air dryer. The water is supposedly wiped from your hands with “a sheet of air traveling at 400 mph.” So says the manufacturer. It’s designed to dry your hands in 12 seconds, using less energy than conventional hand dryers. I’d say the manufacturer still needs to tinker with the technology. I got tired of waiting for the Airblade to do its thing—waiting for the blast of warm air that, of course, never came. So I just wiped my damp hands on my jeans and left. I was just glad that they were still attached to my arms.
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Linked From: December 19th, 2008This Week’s Greatest Hits from the Y&H Blog - Young & Hungry - Washington City Paper
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5:00 pm
I came across one of these contraptions in a hotel restaurant in Chicago last summer. It’s kinda cool—it’s high-powered enough to wick the water off your hands without feeling like you stuck your hand in a wind tunnel. But I recall thinking two things:
a) Do I really need a cool hand dryer?
b) I wondered if the system’s design makes water pool below where you put your hands. Kinda looks like it does. In which case, Bacteria City.
5:02 pm
It works. I used one at Nando’s and it was amazing.
9:10 am
Um, the air blades work really well. You just have to follow the directions and draw your hands up through the blast of air a couple of times…
3:28 am
Neat job=D Will definitely visit again=)