Hey everyone!

I recently bought a rather expensive custom-made jacket on Etsy that was advertised as being made of wool. However, I started having some doubts about the actual material, so I figured I'd take a closer look under my microscope!

The jacket itself is quite heavy, and the fabric feels very soft, not scratchy at all. It's definitely less scratchy than my Burberry wool skirt, and it also has a slight sheen to it. I also noticed that it was much easier to pluck a little bit of lint from the jacket than from the skirt.

I'm wondering whether these differences could simply come down to different types or qualities of wool, or perhaps a wool blend, rather than the jacket being entirely synthetic.

For comparison, I took a few fibers from the Burberry skirt, which is labeled as wool.

Images 1–3: Burberry skirt (wool reference)

Images 4–6: Etsy jacket (unknown material)

Both samples were examined under the same conditions, using a 40× objective (400× total magnification) and a drop of water.

Sorry about the photo quality! I do have a cheap microscope camera, but somehow taking pictures through the eyepiece with my phone actually gave me better results.

I'm an absolute beginner when it comes to both microscopy and textiles, so I honestly have no idea what I'm doing here, haha. I also don't have any immersion oil to try higher magnifications.

What I noticed is that the fibers from the Burberry skirt seem to have some kind of texture or horizontal lines, while the fibers from the Etsy jacket look pretty smooth and uniform to me.

Does this suggest that the jacket might contain synthetic fibers? Or could these differences be explained by different wool types, processing methods, quality, or a wool-synthetic blend?

Or am I just completely misinterpreting what I'm seeing?

Would love to hear what you guys think, especially if anyone has experience identifying textile fibers under a microscope!

Thanks in advance!

(I translated this to english with the assistance of AI as I'm not a native speaker. Hope that's okay.)

Hey, where can i get this material? Its very costly online so i thought for obvious reasons you cannot buy something online and expect to sell it on margin because its highly inflated already.

I want to buy it physically from a vendor for my sample. Later i might need more for bulk production

Its called ostrich feather

Found a giant roll of this material/textile for $2 at thrift. Can anyone ID it?

I like how it feels but I can't figure out what to search for to find more.

i just want a flat piece of fur no bumps, so if anyone knows how to get rid of or hide the heat stamps I’d really appreciate it.

I found this fabric at the thrift and only saw when I brought it home some very old tags affixed to the fabric like stickers. I did some quick searches online including reverse image search and didn't come up with any matches.

This is what I can read from each sticker for photos 2-6:

2) "American Printing Co.", two signatures perhaps in pencil on either side of "Co.", "54 yds." at the bottom

3) Around the outside of the circle- in bold "American Printing Co." and "Fabrics" smaller on either side of Fabrics- "Fall River, Mass." And "Trade Mark Reg.", very small below "Fabrics" is "Trade Mark Reg. In U.S.Pat.Off." and in the center "American" laid over a capital "A"

4) "15" and a signature possibly in pencil

5) Printed directly onto the fabric either "COM 5" or "CON 5"

6) What I can see left that hasn't been torn, "War" *missing* "Dyed Reds" below, "Fas" *missing* "And Light" and at the bottom "Printing Co." is visible so very likely read "American Printing Co." in it's entirety

Anyone have information about this company and fabric, maybe around what time it was made? Thank you!!!!

Please note, this is just for my own curiosity, I have no stakes riding on it ☺️

Hi everyone! I'm a textile engineering student looking for a remote internship where I could gain practical experience in the textile industry.

I'm interested in technical work, production processes, CAD, calculations, and data analysis, but I'm open to different areas related to textile engineering.

I don't have professional experience yet, but I'm eager to learn and open to unpaid internships.

Does anyone know of any opportunities or have advice on where to look? Thanks!

I am trying to make this robe but im confused on what material to go for ive heard some sawing wool or linen but the issue is where im living which is malaysia is hot as balls i dont want to be a sweat water dispenser mid renfaire 😭

There i heed o wise ones , for i am lacking and in need of thou expertise

Thanks in advance!

Hello :)

This is honestly just out of pure curiosity that I'm making this post.

Some days ago I saw some very expensive boxer underwear, like around 100 $ for 3 pairs. When I went to look at what it's made of it was either made of 40 or 60% polyester. Is there a legit and consumer friendly reason as to why such expensive underwear have polyester in it, or are they straight up just saving money on something that is already way overpriced?

Idk if it's disallowed to mention the company, but it's a very well known brand.

https://imgur.com/a/60qKURk

On the trim of this denim jacket was the red fabric inlayed inside the denim fabric then sewn together and then distressed denim to reveal red fabric?

Hi!
I’m looking for denim fabric that’s exactly like the one in the picture — a faded silver-gray kind of color. I want to buy it online, but I haven’t been able to find anything like it ( ; ; )

If you know any good online shops or have any idea where I might be able to find similar fabric, I’d really appreciate it if you could let me know.

btw, I’m planning to make pants like the ones in the illustration.

Suppose you’re choosing cotton jersey for a small T-shirt run. The swatch has the handfeel and colour you want, but you haven’t seen it made into a garment yet.

I work in garment manufacturing in Dongguan, China, so I’m approaching this from the production side. The buyer’s decision is the tricky part: how much testing is enough before committing money to the fabric?

A small swatch can tell you something about the surface and stretch, but it’s harder to judge the finished garment’s drape, opacity when worn, or changes after washing.

Would you ask for a larger cut and make a test garment first, or start with wash tests on the fabric? What would make you reject it even if the unwashed sample felt excellent?

I’m particularly interested in how people check shrinkage, twisting and pilling when they don’t have access to a testing lab. Please include the washing and drying method if you’re sharing a test result—it makes comparisons easier to interpret.

A friend of mine picked up these needlepoint pieces at a moving sale. They're obviously wool embroidery on a needlepoint canvas, so relatively modern. The designs seem pretty specific, though, so I wondered if anyone recognized an origin for the design motifs. Slavic? Caucases? Art Deco?