Cotton, Polyester or Both?

We have all been to the store looking for new shirts and come across the three big fabrics. Ever wonder wonder what the difference between cotton, polyester or a mix of the two mean? Take a few seconds and read on to become an expert for your next shopping trip.

Cotton
Cotton is what can called a tried and true fabric. There are several age ranges for how long it has been around but it seems that cotton was first used for fabric around 5000 bc. Cotton has some excellent properties that has made it so popular.

• Soft on the skin
• Breathes well
• Releases perspiration quickly
• Some variations can hold up to 27 times it's weight of water

The biggest drawback of cotton is that it tends to wrinkle easily but with some finishes even that can be minimized

Polyester
Compared to cotton polyester is a young contender since the first patent was in 1941 but has played a major role in clothing for many years. Polyester has been an ugly duckling since the late 1960's because of the negative public image of the double knit fabric. Polyester has some excellent benefits that include:

• Strong
• Resists stretching and shrinking
• Quick drying
• Wrinkle and mildew resistant
• abrasion resistant
• easily washed

Polyester is less comfortable to wear than cotton and because it doesn't absorb water as well it don't breath as well either.

Poly/Cotton
What happens if you take two items that have advantages to one another and mix them? If done correctly you get the best of both worlds. That's what they have done with Poly/Cotton material. With these two blended you get most of the advantages of both cotton and polyester the biggest differences are:

• Don't dry as fast as polyester but faster than cotton
• May hold more stains than polyester
• Holds less water than cotton

There are several different blends out there and they will be tagged something like 65/35 which means 65% polyester and 35% cotton. There are many other blends like 50/50 or 70/30 but just remember that the first number is polyester and the second one is cotton. The more of one material it has means that the more of its benefits it takes on. So if you want something soft that don't wrinkle then a 65/35 or 70/30 might be right for you but if your looking for a shirt that will release perspiration quickly but is strong and mildew resistant then you would want to try a 50/50 blend.

The next factor that can make a huge difference in a shirt is the weave such as microfiber which is also polyester but we will cover those in a later article.

Going Green

Everybody knows that from an environmental stand point we are in a bad place that it's only going to get worse if we don't change our ways. Everyone's trying to come up with new and unique ideas that will save the world. Maybe what we need to do is look at how we used to do things to help determine our next step.

This won't work in every situation since I don't realistically foresee people abandoning their cars and start riding horses again but with simple everyday tasks that we all take for granted. A perfect example is using your clothes dryer. Often times it's not even that good for your clothes since it can be rough on the fabrics shortening the lifetime of your garments and it's also not that cheap since on average it costs about 35 cents for every load.

Maybe it's time we looked back and pull an old trick that will still work. It's one of the original forms of solar power known as the clothesline. The big question is can it really make a difference. The US census put the number of American households at 115,904,641 so if each household used the clothesline for one load per week it would save $40,566,624 in electricity costs every week and $2,109,464,448 every year. Now this is just a drop in the bucket but every little bit helps and as an added bonus your clothes usually smell better.

Anyhow that’s just my two cents let me know what you think.