Pilling on textile surfaces
Before you get some information and helpful tips about pilling on this page, the most important thing first:
We give you a 12-month anti-pilling guarantee on our 100% merino wool shirts. We are confident that you can expect our quality to last significantly longer than other textiles. Thanks to the special yarn construction of our shirts and the particularly fine yarn, pilling doesn't stand a chance.
Small fluffy balls
You've probably wondered where the little pills and fluffs on your favourite item of clothing come from and what you can do to prevent them from appearing in the first place. And once you have painstakingly removed these small fibre pills, it doesn't take long for new ones to appear.
These small fuzzed balls on your clothing are known as pilling and are caused by small loose fibres that ball up on the surface. You can take preventative measures to minimise or delay the formation of pilling on your clothing.
What you can do
- Wear more often, wash less: Frequent washing is a common cause of pilling. It also depends on the right care.
- Correct care:
- Turn your clothes inside out when washing, preferably using a laundry net
- Wash delicate clothing separately from other laundry
- Wash on a short gentle programme at low temperatures and a low spin speed
- Avoid fabric softener and other chemical additives
- Simply let your clothes air dry and avoid using a tumble dryer
- Avoid mechanical friction (Velcro fasteners and beards are common causes of pilling)
Textiles that are prone to pilling generally have a significantly shorter lifespan than those with anti-pilling properties. The twisting together of several fibres makes the fabric thinner in certain areas and also more prone to damage. Over time, you will also notice that the comfort of the textiles decreases and pilling on your clothing is rather unappealing. It is therefore worth investing in products that offer resistance to pilling.
How can we be so sure?
It's quite simple: we've been working with textiles for over 100 years now and a lot of expertise and experience has accumulated over that amount of time. When developing our shirts, we paid particular attention to this and used a very fine yarn and improved the knitting in a way that minimises the risk of damage to the fabric.
Small fluffy balls
Of course, we have also checked this in our own testing laboratory. After all, there are special standardised test procedures to determine the pilling tendency of textiles, with the top score being a "5". However, we didn't just want to know how our shirts performed in the standard range (1,000-5,000 rotations) and even tested our textiles at 7,500, 10,000 and 15,000 rotations. As the number of spins increases, the fabric shows increased resistance to abrasion and wear. Even at 15,000 rotations, our shirt still scores 4-5 - if that's not a reason to be proud!
If you notice pilling on your shirt in the first 12 months, you will receive a free replacement from us. Simply contact us by email (service@tomfyfe.com), send us photos and let us know your order or invoice number.