How is tweed fabric made?

First, raw wool is dyed and then dried in an industrial drier. These coloured wools are mixed together to make the exact shade of thread needed for a tweed. Each colour is weighed, roughly mixed by hand, and then blended in a giant industrial mixer to create the hue required for the pattern.

Is tweed still made with urine?

Originally this was done by literally ‘walking’ (i.e. treading) the fabric in water, perhaps treated with a proportion of urine for its ammonia as a cleansing agent. But don’t worry, nowadays the process involves nothing more than pure water.

What is so special about Harris Tweed?

Made in only one remote location in the world, Harris Tweed is the only fabric protected by its own act of Parliament, The Harris Tweed Act 1993 (they mean business!). What makes Harris Tweed so very special is that any cloth that is officially Harris Tweed is woven in a weaver’s shed on the island.

How ethical is Harris Tweed?

A Fabric for life Harris Tweed is a high performance fabric: durable, requiring minimal laundering, and long lasting. And being made from wool, is fully biodegradable.

Where are Harris Tweed products made?

Outer Hebrides of Scotland
Raw Materials. One of the most desirable wool textiles in the world, Harris Tweed, is produced in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland; on the one island with two names, separated only by a mountain range – the islands of Lewis and Harris.

Where is tweed fabric made?

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Is Harris Tweed still made?

Every 50 metres of fabric is inspected and approved before being stamped by hand with the Orb trademark. No other fabric can call itself Harris Tweed. It is amazing to think in this mechanised and mass produced world, Harris Tweed is still woven by hand on the Western Isles of Scotland.

Is Harris Tweed made in Scotland?

Harris Tweed, (Clò Mór or Clò Hearach in Gaelic) is a tweed cloth that is handwoven by islanders at their homes in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, finished in the Outer Hebrides, and made from pure virgin wool dyed and spun in the Outer Hebrides.

Why is tweed soaked in urine?

Originally, fulling was carried out by the pounding of the woollen cloth with a club, or the fuller’s feet or hands. In Scottish Gaelic tradition, this process was accompanied by waulking songs, which women sang to set the pace. Urine was so important to the fulling business that it was taxed.

Is all Harris Tweed made on Harris?

To this day, Harris Tweed is the only fabric in the world protected by an Act of Parliament. This states that it must be made ‘with 100\% pure virgin wool, dyed, spun and finished in the Outer Hebrides and woven by hand by the Islanders in their homes on the Islands of Lewis, Harris, Uist and Barra’.

What is tweed made from?

wool
Most tweeds are made entirely of wool; but an increasing number consist of blends of wool and cotton, wool and rayon, or wool and man-made fibres, each of which imparts a special property. The word tweed was not derived from the River Tweed, although the cloth was manufactured in the Tweed Valley.

What is Harris Tweed made out of?

virgin wools
Harris Tweed cloth is made with pure virgin wools, which are blended together to gain the advantages of their unique characteristics.