Care of cashmere
For the best care of cashmere we recommend either hand washing or using the delicate cycle on the washing machine; cashmere loves water.
Hand washing tips
Always use warm water and a specialised detergent; let the garment soak for about 15 minutes. Obviously avoid rubbing or twisting the garment. Finally rinse with cold water.
Machine Washing – care of cashmere
Choose the delicate cycle on the machine, this is a specialised program that washes wollen garments at a temperature of 30°, temeratures lower than 30° are useless because the dirt will not dissolve.
Attention!
At tempertures higher than 30° you risk ruining the fibers; always use small amounts of the specialised detergent and use the lowest spin cycle, lay the garment flat to dry; top tip: we recommend using a towel to remove the excess water.
Ironing and storage – care of cashmere
If the washing instructions have been correctly followed it should not be necessary to iron the garment; our advice for the best storage of cashmere items is to keep them inside out and at a low room temperature; this will avoid damaging the fibers, if you want to use steam keep it at a distance of 5 cm from the garment.
Top tips: store the garment inside out, protect it with a cotton cloth / bag and if you must iron use a very low temeprature
Characteristics
The first time you wear your cashmere garment it is possible that it do something we call “pilling”; this is the formation of small irregular balls of cashmere, known as pills; these pills are caused by rubbing and are non considered a sign of inferior quality cashmere but rather a result of wear. In fact after two or three washes the excess fluff will disappear and the fibers will re appear in all their original beauty; if is possible to manually remove these “pills” with the help of a soft brush or specialised comb.
Frequent washing is not a problem as cashmere loves water; the Hircus goats ( from whom we collect the fibers) live in difficult conditions, in the open air often with a lot of rain; when they are wet the fibers get soft and expand but when they dry, they return to their original state; following this characteristic your cashmere garment renews itself after every wash.
Conservation
In the warm seasons if not covered cashmere will attract moths, who love this precious fiber; to protect from moths you can fill a hankerchief with lavender , cloves, mint and cinnamon, place this inside the folded cashmere garment before storing in the wardrobe; it is very important not to hang the cashmere garments but to store them folded.
Top tips: store your cashmere garments in a sealed box or packet; regularly spray your wardrobe with an anti-moths product.