How Wool Fabric Is Made

Shearing

The first step in making wool fabric is producing the wool. Wool sheep are distinctly different from meat sheep and are bred primarily to produce a good quality, easily spun coat. Different breeds produce wools with different qualities; however, merino wools are typically the softest. During shearing, the wool is cut and clipped off the sheep to produce a fleece.

Preparing the Wool

Before the raw wool can be made into fabric, it must be prepared for spinning. The wool must be washed to remove the natural lanolin, as well as dirt and vegetable matter. The clean wool is then carded or brushed to lay the fibers side by side in long ropelike strands called roving or flat, broad batts.

Spinning and Weaving

Carded wool is spun, or twisted, into long strands of thread. The finer the initial threads, the finer the wool fabric will be. Once the wool has been spun into thread, a weaving loom is threaded with warp, or vertically oriented threads. The weft, or horizontal, thread then is run over and under each of the warp threads. As the weft threads are pushed down with each row, wool fabric is created.

Dyeing

While the wool can be dyed in an earlier stage, wool fabric is most commonly dyed once it is woven. Commercial dyeing begins with bleaching or color removal. Bleaching removes the natural color in the wool, allowing for predictable dye results. Wool is most commonly dyed with protein-based dyes; however, natural dyes do also work well on wool fabrics.

Resources

• Textiles: Wool