Cotton is the undisputed leader in the textile industry. But it was not always so. For a long time, wool was used everywhere in the world. She occupied almost 80% of the market. But in the 1800s, cotton became more popular and became the third most common after wool and flax. Cotton cotton strife. Why some T-shirts are not “demolished”, and some can withstand only a few washes.
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The quality of cotton depends on: fiber length, fiber thickness, assembly method and processing. The best cotton is Egyptian. It has the longest thinnest fibers. An Egyptian cotton bedding set can cost around 500USD. Quality cotton also grows in Peru, but it is not so popular due to the difficulty of growing. The bulk of Peruvian cotton is harvested by hand.
Also the Indian and American Pima varieties are considered to be of the highest quality.
According to the international classification, cotton is divided into: extra short, short, medium, long and extra long (meaning fiber length) Short cotton is about 2 cm long, and extra long reaches 6 cm.
Fiber length is a critical indicator of cotton quality.
Die thickness ranges from 15 to 20 microns. Short cotton is usually thicker and coarser. Longer and thinner fibers are more expensive. The highest quality fabrics are made from long staple cotton.
Assembly can be machine and manual. Manual is preferred. The fact is that cotton bolls ripen at different times. If the cotton is harvested by hand, then the same field is harvested several times and only the ripe cotton is harvested each time. If cotton is harvested by machine, then both ready-to-harvest cotton and overripe and unripe cotton are collected. All this is reflected in the quality of the canvas.
Currently, the vast majority of cotton is harvested by machine. Nevertheless, there are still farms producing high quality cotton that are hand-picked.
After harvesting, the cotton is cleaned of leaves and other unwanted debris and sent to the factory. Already at the factory, raw cotton is passed through several production processes that help cleanse the cotton from seeds, dirt, straighten the cotton fibers and prepare it for yarn production.
The lowest quality yarn is called open-end (open-end, air-yarn). Short cotton is used for its manufacture. This kind of fabric is rough, looks a little sloppy and is much less durable than long cotton fabric.
If the yarn has gone through several stages of cleaning, sorting and rejection of short fibers, then such a yarn is called combed. The fabric made of combed yarns is smoother, without roughness, holds its shape better, is more wear-resistant and visually more “presentable”.
