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Wool is a type of fabric derived from the hairs of various animals. While most people associate the word “wool” with sheep, there are, in fact, a variety of distinct types of wool that producers derive from animals other than sheep.

To make wool, producers harvest the hairs of animals and spin them into yarn. They then weave this yarn into garments or other forms of textiles. Wool is known for its durability and thermally insulating properties; depending on the type of hair that producers use to make wool, this fabric may benefit from the natural insulative effects that keep the animal that produced the hair warm throughout the winter.

Throughout the centuries, wool and cotton have vied for supremacy as the most-used textile in the world. Today, each of these fabrics fills a particular niche, and wool remains prized for its unique attributes. While cotton consists almost entirely of plant cellulose, wool consists of approximately 97 percent protein and 3 percent fat, which makes it uniquely suited for certain applications that cotton isn’t suited for.

When it is woven into textiles, wool has a natural waviness called “crimp.” This crimp contributes to wool’s insulative properties, which exist because the bulkiness of wool naturally traps air. Some types of wool have more crimp than others, and the more crimp there is in a woolen garment, the more insulative it is.

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How Is Wool Fabric Made?

The production of wool begins with the shearing of wool-bearing animals. Some animals bear wool once per year, and others bear wool multiple times throughout the year.

Next, the shorn wool is cleaned and sorted into bales. There are a variety of ways to remove the greasy lanolin in raw wool, but most large wool producers use chemical catalysts for this process.

Once the wool fibers are clean and sorted, they are carded, which is the process of making the fibers into long strands. These carded strands are then spun into yarn, and after a final washing, this yarn can be woven into garments and other types of woolen textiles.

How Is Wool Fabric Used?

Over the years, human beings have found hundreds of ways to use wool. While wool is primarily used in consumer applications, this substance is also popular in industrial applications for its durability and flame-retardant qualities.

While finer types of wool might be used to make garments that directly contact the skin, it’s much more common to find wool used for outerwear or other types of garments that don’t make direct bodily contact. For instance, most of the world’s formal suits consist of wool fibers, and this textile is also commonly used to make sweaters, hats, gloves, and other types of accessories and apparel.