Patent ID: 7036696

Claim:
A collapsible clothes hanger comprising: a) a hook member; b) an anchor body supported by said hook member, said anchor body including a pivot member mounted therein, said pivot member having opposite pivot ends disposed proximal to opposite sides of said body, defining a pivot axis extending there through; c) a pair of hanger arms comprising: d) respective proximal and distal ends and respective spaced apart, opposite lateral sides with respective top and bottom edges; e) said arms disposed with each of said proximal ends disposed adjacent to said opposite sides of said anchor body and with said distal ends extending away from said anchor body; f) said proximal ends further comprising respective rotatable supports to said opposite pivot ends of said pivot member so that said distal ends are rotatable over about ¼ of a full rotation about said pivot axis from a fully closed position with said respective bottom edges disposed proximal to each other, to a fully open position in which said distal arm ends project away from said anchor body and essentially opposite to each other; g) a first stop member defined on one of said proximal arm ends and a second stop member defined on the other of said proximal arm ends, said 1 st and said 2 nd stop members arranged to contact each other and prevent said arms from rotating beyond said fully open position; h) a latch mechanism operable to automatically latch each one of said arms to said anchor body in a full open and latched mode when said each arm is moved into said full open position from a less than full open position; i) a release mechanism operable to release said latch mechanism on each one of said arms, so that said each one of said arms can be rotated from said full open and latched mode toward a less than full open position; j) a resilient urging member continuously acting to force said pair of arms to rotate away from each other about said pivot member from said fully closed position, through said less than fully open position toward said fully open position.