CARE GUIDE - for the love of wool ❤︎

If you love your wool underwear more than your sister and want them to stay with you for a long time, read our guide. Caring for natural fibers requires a little knowledge and effort, but they'll reward you with beautiful appearance and softness. Not to mention their thermal properties. It's worth knowing that these can be lost by improperly washing wool.

The first dilemma we hear about most often is:

Washing machine or hand wash?

We recommend hand washing our bodysuits and undershirts that use metal or plastic components, such as snaps or underwires. You can wash our other underwear in the washing machine, BUT only on the wool cycle.

What is particularly important in this process?

Temperature ♨︎

And it's not just about avoiding hot water and washing at a maximum of 30 degrees Celsius.

Wool doesn't like temperature changes. The standard 30°C cycle heats the water during washing, but the rinse cycle is cold, which causes the fibers to become irreversibly brittle and/or felted. Felted wool stops heating because the channels that would normally hold heated air lose their shape. The wool cycle will maintain roughly the same water temperature throughout the wash cycle, between 20 and 30°C.

Spinning

It can't be too intense, as this causes the fiber scales to become entangled, resulting in pilling and—again—felting, and ultimately, loss of the wool's thermal insulation properties. A wool program should set the spin speed to 400-600 rpm or even replace the drum rotation with gentle rocking. This will keep the wool's surface smooth and prevent shrinkage. And it will keep you warm.

Detergents

This is a very important issue and often neglected. It's worth knowing that overly harsh detergents (including fabric softeners) change the fiber's structure. They strip it of elasticity and lanolin, which is responsible for thermoactivity. Consequently, weakened fibers will be more susceptible to breakage and, over time, holes will appear. Therefore, the best thing you can do for your wool is to wash it by hand or on a program dedicated to wool fibers, using gentle, eco-friendly detergents designed for wool and silk fabrics. We use and recommend Sonett . We like it for its natural, body- and environmentally-friendly ingredients and excellent results. It leaves woolen clothes super soft and smelling wonderful.

How to avoid holes in delicate wool knits

If you decide to machine wash, carefully separate your clothes and underwear before loading them into the washing machine. Pay attention to the ingredients (ideally, wash wool only with wool), colors (avoid light-colored underwear with intense colors), and eliminate all items with metal or plastic components (buttons, zippers, snaps, hooks, or appliqués). These components can weaken the fibers during the spin cycle and damage the surface of delicate fabrics. And even if holes don't appear immediately, they will appear over time.

And remember, choosing the right detergent (a gentle chemical designed for natural fibers) is equally important! (See point above).

 

What else shouldn't you do to wool?

✘ Do not dry woolen clothes in a tumble dryer - they will shrink by at least one size!

✘ Do not use bleach on even light woolen clothes - the chemicals will damage the fibers!

✘ Iron at a low temperature, or use a steam iron, but keep a sufficient distance so that the steam temperature is not too high.

✘ Dry cleaning is always a risk! See the section on detergents.

✔️ It's best to dry woolen clothes flat – wet wool is quite heavy and stretches under its own weight. This rule certainly holds true for thicker knits. The thin merino we use for our underwear is much less susceptible to this. But letting it lie flat certainly won't harm it.