Greetings Crafty Fam,

We hope you are all safe & well & enjoying the last of the English sunshine. 

We are delighted to announce that our news blends of Wool & Alpaca are in production and will be ready to launch shortly. 

The Grey baby Alpaca Tops that sold out, is now available to order again from the website. 

We shall be adding some new and exciting blends in the coming weeks. 

The clip this year has produced some wonderful brown & fawn shades which we are sure you will all love.  

This month we wanted to talk about Silk & how it is made. 

The silkworm is the lava or caterpillar of bombyx mori (the silkworm of the mulberry tree). It is entirely dependent on humans for its reproduction and its preferred food is white mulberry leaves. The eggs take about ten days to hatch and the larvae enclose themselves in a cocoon of raw silk produced from their salivary glands. Each cocoon is made of threads of raw silk which are between 300 and 900 metres long. This type of silk is referred to as Mulberry Silk. 

Tussah silk is a textured wild silk, produced by wild silkworms in the tropical and semi-tropical forests in China and India. The cocoons are gathered after the moth emerges and the silk is beige or brownish in tone.  

Silk’s absorbency makes it comfortable to wear in warm weather. Its low conductivity also keeps warm air close to the skin during cold weather. Hence it is often used for clothing such as shirts, ties, blouses, high fashion cloths, lingerie and kimonos. 

Silk has an attractive lustre and drape which also makes it suitable for many furnishing and upholstery applications. The tensile strength of silk makes it a great product to blend with other fibres like Wool & Alpaca to add length as well as strength to the yarn whilst still feeling soft and luxurious.  

Browse our silk blends on the website here.  

We hope you have found that interesting and we look forward to talking again next month.

Don’t forget to keep tagging us on Facebook & Instagram in your Crafty Creations @craftyfibresuk