How To Identify The Quality Of Shirt Fabric?

Men who like to wear shirts know that the most common type of shirt is cotton, which has many advantages. It is comfortable and breathable to wear, soft to the touch, and has good moisture permeability.

As an important item in men's wardrobes, shirts also have advantages and disadvantages in terms of materials. Cotton is divided into three types of long-staple cotton, fine-cotton cotton and coarse-cotton cotton according to the length of cotton fiber.

Most of the clothes we often wear are fine-fleece cotton fabrics. Fine-fiber cotton accounts for 85% of the total cotton output, while long-staple cotton accounts for only 3%. Long-staple cotton has more stringent requirements on the planting environment and is suitable for growing in places with less precipitation and easy irrigation. The overall output of long-staple cotton is low, the quality is excellent, the fiber is soft and long (generally 33 to 39 mm), the strength is large, and it has a sense of gloss after spinning. Therefore, long-staple cotton is known as "the best among cotton" and is a key material for high-count yarn shirts. Of course, the price is more than twice that of fine-staple cotton.

Objectively speaking, the place of origin is very important for cotton, and it needs to have a unique geographical location and climatic characteristics. Under the same heat condition, the growth period of long-staple cotton is 10-15 days longer than that of fine-staple cotton. Long-staple cotton has a long growth cycle and requires more light than ordinary cotton varieties.

Long-staple cotton is divided into many types, more well-known: the world's recognized best cotton is Sea Island Cotton produced in the West Indies. The annual output of island cotton is only 0.0004% of the global cotton output, which is the existence of the pyramidal tip. 100% West Indian Sea Island Cotton, the price of the shirts basically reached more than 5K, most people can't buy them. In addition, Egyptian Cotton (Egyptian Cotton) produced in Egypt, Pima Cotton (Pima Cotton) produced in the United States and Peru are among the best cottons, and cotton species imported from Egypt are also grown in Xinjiang, China. Many long-staple cottons on the market are also from Xinjiang. The longer and thinner the velvet of the cotton fabric, the better the cotton, and the better the breathability and gloss. High-count yarn cotton fabric must be woven from long-staple cotton.

When we usually buy shirts, we often encounter these conceptual words: yarn, yarn count, density, number of strands.

Yarn is to make fiber into "long", which is what we usually call yarn.

Yarn count refers to the thickness of the yarn. The higher the yarn count, the finer the yarn. The shirt fabric is generally measured in English units, usually expressed by the English letter S. One pound (454 grams) of cotton yarn with a length of 840 yards (0.9144 meters/yard) has a fineness of 1. Like a pound of cotton yarn, its length is 10*840 yards, and its fineness is 10S. There are 80 840 yards of length for 1 pound of yarn, and the yarn fineness is 80 counts, which can be recorded as 80S.

Generally speaking, shirt fabrics above 80S can be called high-count fabrics. At present, the common high-count shirt fabrics in the market are 80S, 100S, and 120S, and even higher, there are 140S, 170S, and yarn count fabrics above 200S are relatively rare. At present, the highest yarn count cotton fabric on the global market can reach 300s. The higher the yarn count, the higher the cost. In addition to the price of cotton fabrics that are too high, they are much more difficult to manage, and are not suitable for daily wear. At present, 60-140S is mostly used for formal shirts on the market, and yarns under 60S are mostly used for casual shirts. The yarn count of this type of fabric is still relatively practical, and the cost performance is relatively high.

Density refers to the number of warp and weft yarns arranged per square inch, called the warp and weft density

The number of strands usually we can directly woven into a fabric with a single yarn, called a single strand. If two yarns are twisted together and woven into a fabric, it is called a double strand. Therefore, the double-stranded fabric is usually thicker, and the durability is higher. This is not to say that single yarn is not good, mainly based on seasonal needs and fabric style to decide whether to use single yarn or double yarn.