Once Threatened with Extinction, Towel Animals Are Absolutely Thriving
Made famous by resorts and cruises in the 1990s, the folding of towels into cute animals is gaining popularity, resulting in countless towel art competition and “room reveal” videos.
When Royal Caribbean passenger Mikayla Nogueira posted on her Instagram Story that she loved towel animals, she didn’t think anything would come of it. But upon returning to her cabin, the TikTok star discovered the entirety of her room transformed into a towel animal jungle: a colossal alligator with googly eyes, a silly monkey hanging from a clipped hanger, two saccharine swans, necks bowed together in the shape of a heart. The cabin was absolutely crawling with anthropomorphized linen.
“We didn’t know where to sleep, so we slept on the floor,” Nogueira says in the video. “We didn’t want to disturb the animals.”
Native to 90s-era cruises and beach resorts, the humble towel animal has endured decades of travel industry transformations—any number of which could have led to its extinction. And yet with so many advances in luxury travel and hospitality—ocean floor submarine tours, custom bath menus, hotel robots, to name a few—it seems almost an anomaly that towel art, that simple terry species, has survived.
And, even more surprisingly, given the countless YouTube tutorials and TikTok “room reveal” surprises like the one Nogueira experienced, it’s clear that towel art is having something of a moment.
Industry experts in the US believe that towel animals were popularized by Carnival Cruise Line in the 1990s. “Towel animals debuted decades ago on our cruise ships,” says Stefan Christoffersson, vice president of housekeeping, laundry, and hotel services management for Carnival. The story goes that a housekeeping member from Thailand started folding guests’ clothes into shapes of animals while tending to rooms. The technique caught on among the stewards, and the rest was hospitality history.
“When the tradition first started, guests would see popular animals like dogs and elephants. However, today we see an array of fun animals,” Christoffersson says. Indeed, towel frogs, rhinos, and octopi have been spotted onboard. “It’s a fun task our housekeeping team does, so the creativity comes naturally and is different every time.” To add a further touch of whimsy, Carnival housekeepers might even accessorize a stingray with a sunhat the guest left behind, or hang a monkey from the cabin mirror.
The cruise line also offers towel folding demonstrations onboard, so passengers can learn how to create their own little guys at home. And when itineraries allow, the housekeeping team will surprise guests by swarming the main poolside with an abundance of creatures in a zoological spectacle referred to as “Towel Animal Zoo.”
The towel animal renaissance is closely linked with the proliferation of cruise-related content on social media. There’s a TikTok trend, for instance, that involves rating the towel animals one is given each day on a cruise. For Disney Cruise Line, the weirder the towel animal, the better. TikToker Tara Michelle reveals it’s all about the shock factor, and has videos of the towels-for-legs spilling out of her toilet to prove it.
Towel animals might carry kitschy connotations in the US, but industry experts say that in many parts of Asia, where the art is likely to have originated, they evoke a more classic form of housekeeping. “Towel art is popular in Thailand, and in Asia generally, I believe due to a cultural emphasis on attention to detail and personalized care in hospitality,” says Surapa Porchan (Naeng), executive housekeeper at Anantara Golden Triangle Elephant Camp & Resort. “In Thailand, there are indeed competitions for towel art, usually held internally among the hotel housekeeping teams, with the biggest ones happening during Housekeeping Appreciation Week. These provide a platform for housekeeping teams to showcase their talents, exchange ideas, and learn new techniques.”
If you’re headed to Asia on a towel animal safari, Porchan recommends luxury hotels as your best bet. But you’re also bound to see terry elephants scattered across Thai hotel rooms on National Elephant Day, celebrated on March 13, as a gesture of respect for the country’s national symbol. “Towel art can also carry the cultural significance of the location, for example by creating elephants—a cultural icon in Thailand—or monkeys if on the southern islands like Koh Samui or Phuket,” she adds.
Behind every gently-folded animal is a highly dexterous towel artist. “I can make anything,” says Manish Dhimal, executive housekeeper at Silver Mountain School of Hotel Management in Kathmandu, Nepal. He says this, not out of arrogance, but to express that the tools for learning how to create even the most exotic of animals are within reach for anyone. “There’s no such thing as complexity in towel art if you have the base knowledge,” he says. “If I have an idea, I can watch a video, and it will be very easy to make.”
And that’s exactly how Dhimal, who has spent seven years working in hospitality throughout India, China, Macau, and now Nepal, learned his craft: a mix of hotel training sessions and YouTube. Today he serves as a housekeeping instructor, teaching students everything from the process of cleaning guest rooms to decorating them.
First semester students at his school in Nepal start with simple animals that may appeal to children: elephants, both sitting and standing; ducklings, which are made with paper eyes; and monkeys. Second semester students are taught how to make a basket of towel flowers, usually accompanied by chocolates, should a guest request to surprise a loved one. Third semester students are tasked with the more advanced peacocks or swans, reserved for anniversaries and weddings.
“After the towel art classes are completed, I will ask my students to show me creations I haven't taught them," Dhimal says. “And I will give them marks as per the towel art they present.” It’s always rewarding, the teacher says, to see his students getting more comfortable with the art as their knowledge grows. The monkey session, he notes, is always a lively one.
Historically, towel animals have always suggested a bit of mystery, a cheeky trace of the stranger who makes your bed and tidies your room. But these days, as Dhimal points out, the art is a bit more personal. “We write a note to the guest, providing the name of the staff member,” he says. “The guest should know who it was that made that towel art.”
This newfound level of interaction is coinciding with the growing popularity of towel art on TikTok.
Deborah and Tyler Raarup of travel blog Raarup Adventures, for example, shared a TikTok from their cruise showing how they turned the surprise on their housekeeper by gathering up all the towel animals from their stay for a final presentation on the last day—a token of their appreciation. In the video, they place the white cotton creatures on top of a bed, their googly eyes looking innocently toward the camera, not quite camera ready.
Although cruise lines, resorts, and hotels will continue to compete for their guests’ admiration with complicated water slides, in-house DJs, and moving bars, the simple towel animal, in all of its analog glory, will continue to delight those lucky enough to receive it. Because behind every neatly folded monkey or carefully sculpted elephant is a housekeeper who took the time to make you something special, just because.