About wool

Well about wool, there’s quite a lot to know. This article will stick with addressing the washing and felting (or fulling) of wool.

As some of you might know, or had the horror of experiencing, washing wool can be quite a drag. Every time feels like playing the lottery: will you win back the jumper you put into the machine or walk away empty handed? Now, there are a few basic principles that apply when it comes to washing wool that’ll ease your burdens:

• First of all, you don’t really have to wash wool that often. About every 6 months or so will do. Does that sound disgusting to you? Well, it’s not.
  For most people, cotton is the point of reference. Now, cotton stains, in many ways. Its fibres are twined and bumpy, and dirt gets into it cavities as well as into the actual fibre (when wet). Wool fibre, on the other hand, is rounder with less cavities, and doesn’t allow for dirt to penetrate into the actual fibre. (Imagine having dirt within your own hair straws). Because of this, just hanging your wool garment outside for a few hours will freshen it up enough to wear a while longer.
• When you finally do wash, there are a few things to think about. You’ll need a machine that has a hand wash- or wool-program. Preferably the latter. You’ll need not to pack too many garments in at once, just a few items per wash. Finally, you’ll need a wool detergent. This is important, since ordinary detergents are likely to stick to and ruin the wool.
• When your garments done washing, you’ll have to leave it to dry flat. You might want to reshape it a bit whilst damp as well. Don’t bother trying to tumble dry it, might just as well toss it in the bin then.

Why all the hassle? This is due to the construction of the fibre. If you look at the first picture, you’ll see that the fibre has scales. Now imagine a jumper made out a lot of these. Put that mental jumper into a washing machine and let it spin and rub against all of the rest of the garments. This will cause the scales on the fibres to hook on to the scales of others, forcing the fibres together. This phenomenon is called felting. This is the reason why some of your wool garments come out of the washing machine (or tumble dryer) half the size they were.

Washing with the wool-program basically means that the garment is draped in water and detergent, and every now and then only moved around slightly. And that’s how you should wash it as well, should you wash it by hand.

If you’re tired of fearing for your garments well being, you should look for Superwash-treated ones in the future. These have got a really thin plastic film covering the surface of the fibre (seen on the second picture), removing the unwanted felting effect otherwise caused by the scales.

There you go!