Learn Hardcore Spanish (Spain): Hoy la colada está seca y huele muy bien. - Today the laundry is dry and smells very good.

la colada = the batch/load of clothes being washed or just washed.
la ropa = clothes in general (not necessarily being washed).
la lavandería = the laundromat or laundry business (the place, not the clothes).

So hacer la colada means to do the laundry. Saying Hoy la colada está seca focuses on this load of laundry, not on clothes in general.

Why is it está seca and not es seca?

Spanish uses estar for temporary states and results of actions, and ser for more permanent characteristics.

está seca = is dry (now), describing the current state/result after drying.
es seca would suggest that being dry is a permanent quality of the laundry, which doesn’t make sense here.

So está seca is correct because the dryness is a changeable condition.

Why is the adjective seca and not seco here?

Adjectives in Spanish agree in gender and number with the noun they describe.

The noun is la colada (feminine singular).
Therefore the adjective must also be feminine singular: seca.

If the noun were masculine singular, you’d use seco (for example, el suelo está seco – the floor is dry).

What is going on with the verb huele? What infinitive does it come from, and how is it conjugated?

Huele is the third-person singular form of the verb oler (to smell). Oler is irregular: the stem changes and it adds an h in most forms.

Present indicative:

yo huelo
tú hueles
él / ella / usted huele
nosotros / nosotras olemos
vosotros / vosotras oléis
ellos / ellas / ustedes huelen

So la colada huele muy bien = the laundry smells very good.

Why do we say huele muy bien and not huele muy buena?

In Spanish, when you talk about how something smells, you normally use the adverb bien or mal, not an adjective like bueno or malo.

huele bien / muy bien = it smells good / very good.
huele mal / muy mal = it smells bad / very bad.

Using bueno would describe the thing itself (e.g. es bueno = it is good), not how it smells. That’s why huele muy bien is the natural choice.

Why is there no subject pronoun like ella or ella está seca y ella huele… in this sentence?

Spanish usually omits subject pronouns when the subject is clear from context or from the verb ending. Here, la colada is the subject, so repeating it or replacing it with ella is unnecessary.

La colada está seca y huele muy bien is normal and natural.
La colada está seca y ella huele muy bien sounds redundant and less natural.

The subject is understood to be la colada in both verbs.

Why is muy used before bien in huele muy bien? Can you use muy with adverbs?

Yes. Muy is used to intensify both adjectives and adverbs.

With adjectives: muy seco, muy limpio, muy grande.
With adverbs: muy bien, muy mal, muy rápido.

So huele bien = it smells good, and huele muy bien = it smells very good.

Could you also say huele bien or huele a algo, and what’s the difference?

Yes:

huele bien = it smells good (neutral level).
huele muy bien = it smells very good (stronger).
huele a jabón / huele a fresco / huele a limpio = it smells of soap / fresh / clean.

Holer a + noun/adjective tells you what it smells like. Holer bien/mal (muy bien/muy mal) tells you whether the smell is pleasant or unpleasant.

Why does the sentence start with Hoy? Could you say La colada está seca hoy y huele muy bien instead?

Both word orders are grammatically correct:

Hoy la colada está seca y huele muy bien.
La colada está seca hoy y huele muy bien.

Putting Hoy at the beginning is very common and slightly emphasizes the time frame: As for today, the laundry is dry and smells very good. Moving hoy after the verb is also acceptable but a bit less typical in this type of short statement.

Do you ever need a preposition with hoy, like en hoy or por hoy?

In general, hoy is used without a preposition when it simply means today:

Hoy trabajo. = I work today.
Nos vemos hoy. = We’ll see each other today.

Forms like por hoy or de hoy exist, but they have extra meaning:

Por hoy es suficiente. = That’s enough for today.
La noticia de hoy. = Today’s news.

In your sentence, Hoy la colada está seca…, hoy stands alone and does not take a preposition.

How would this idea typically be expressed in Latin America? Do they also use la colada?

In most of Latin America, la colada is not commonly used for laundry. People more often say la ropa or la ropa lavada. Examples:

Hoy la ropa ya está seca y huele muy bien.
Hoy la ropa está seca y huele muy bien.

So la colada in the sense of laundry is a very Peninsular (Spain) usage.

What does colada mean outside of the laundry context (for example, in piña colada)?

The word colada comes from colar = to strain, to filter.

In piña colada, it refers to a drink that has been strained (no pulp).
In some contexts, colada can mean the liquid that has been strained or filtered.

In Spain, this same noun extended its meaning to the load of clothes that has been washed and rinsed (i.e., “run through the washing process”), hence la colada for laundry.

How do you pronounce huele and colada? Is the h in huele silent?

Yes, in Spanish the h is always silent.

huele → roughly WEH-leh:
- h: silent
- ue: like we in wet but a single syllable with the e
- Stress on the first syllable: HUE-le.
colada → koh-LA-da:
- co like co in coffee
- la as in la
- da like da in data (but shorter)
- Stress on the middle syllable: co-LA-da.

So the whole phrase sounds like: OY la ko-LA-da ES-ta SE-ka i WÉ-le mui BYEN (approximate English-style transcription).