The present invention relates to fabric towel holders, more particularly to a fabric towel holder comprising a pocket for holding hand towels.
Homeowners often expend considerable efforts and financial means on the interior design of their homes, guest bedrooms and bathrooms included. As a result, guest bathrooms are often exquisitely decorated with beautiful and expensive accessories, among them hand towels and washcloths elaborately selected and presented in a way that enhances the overall bathroom design.
Often times, guests hesitate to use the homeowners"" hand towels because they do not want to inadvertently dirty the towels or disturb the bathroom""s design. In addition, many people are cautious and wish to protect themselves from contagious diseases, and are highly reluctant to use someone else""s cloth towels. Disposable paper towels are preferred. At present, there is a variety of paper towels with attractive designs whose qualities make them appealing to homeowners for use by their guests. Unfortunately, attractive holders for these disposable paper towels are difficult to find.
Evans, U.S. Pat. No. 2,669,737, and Moss, U.S. Pat. No. 5,326,610, disclose washcloths with a built-in pocket that can hold a bar of soap, ice or other cold material. Longemann, U.S. Pat. No. 5,770,284, discloses a sports towel with an integrated storage pocket that has a closure device to secure items within the pocket.
Lucke, U.S. Pat. No. 4,403,366, discloses a removable towel means comprising a U-shaped clip support member mountable on the pants or accessories worn by the user, and a detachable length of toweling. The toweling can be attached to the support member by loop and hook gripping means, and may have an integral pocket with or without loop and hook means. Debronsky, Jr. et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,797,142, discloses a golf towel assembly comprising an upper portion for fastening to a golfer""s front waist area by various means, one of which may be Velcro(copyright) fasteners, and a lower, terry cloth portion for wiping debris from a golf club.
An, U.S. Pat. No. 5,761,761, discloses a rectangular tri-sectioned golf towel with an inner and outer sides made from different materials, and an upper end permanently stitched. A Velcro(copyright) looping patch can be secured adjacent to the permanently stitched end, and a second hooking patch can then be attached near the opposite, not-bound end of the same side and section of the towel.
Watabe, U.S. Pat. No. 5,286,019, discloses a combination of a golf club handle support and a wiper, the handle support comprising a shaft with a semi-circular bracket attached to one of its ends, and the wiper comprising a fabric material component and a toweling material component. The wiper can be attached to the support by Velcro(copyright) pads fastened to the towel in such a way that one end of the towel can be folded over the bracket and held to the remainder by the Velcro(copyright) fastening tabs.
None of the above references, taken either singlely or in combination, describes or suggests the instant invention as claimed. What is needed and desirable is a fabric towel holder to hold and display disposable hand towels while coordinating with the overall bathroom design.
The present invention relates to a fabric towel holder constructed to hold hand towels for use in guest bathrooms. In one preferred embodiment, the fabric towel holder comprises a fabric sheet such as a standard sized hand towel with a fabric member, a washcloth for example, folded and sewn on to the front of the standard sized hand towel so that the wash cloth as attached to the fabric sheet, forms a pocket. Preferably, the hand towel is folded longitudinally with the washcloth pocket positioned on its front. The back of the hand towel preferably comprises fastening means such as Velcro(copyright) hook and loop fasteners. When the hand towel is folded transversely about a towel ring or hanging loop, the hook and loop fasteners fasten the back of the hand towel so that it does not slip off the towel ring because of the weight of objects in the pocket, the disposable paper hand towels for example. The pocket may also be used to hold other small bath or grooming objects.
In one preferred embodiment, the fabric towel holder for holding hand towels comprises a fabric sheet, a standard sized hand towel for example, that has a front and a back. The back comprises an upper section and a lower section. The fabric sheet has a transverse axis and a longitudinal axis. The fabric sheet can be folded along the transverse axis so that the upper section of the back is adjacent to the lower section of the back. When a hook fastener is attached to the upper section of the back side and a loop fastener is attached to the lower section of the back side, the loop fastener adheres to the hook fastener so that the upper section is adjacent to and fastened to the lower section of the back.
A fabric member can be fixedly attached to the fabric sheet so that the fabric member, when attached to the fabric sheet, defines a pocket. The pocket can be adapted to hold smaller hand towels, decorative paper hand towels or small bath items. Preferably, the fabric sheet can be folded longitudinally either in half or thirds and the longitudinal ends seamed. The fabric member or washcloth can be folded and positioned on the bottom front of folded fabric sheet to form the pocket. Disposable or smaller hand towels such as attractive paper towels or napkins can be placed within the pocket. When folded transversely over a towel rod or ring, the fabric towel holder of this invention can be coordinated to the overall decorative design of the guest bathroom.
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USPTO Backgrounds