The Rug Library

Jute fibre, made mostly of cellulose and lignin, comes from the bast (phloem or 'skin') of the plant stem rather than from seeds or leaves.

Retting separates bast fibres from the rest of the plant stem using microbial or chemical action that breaks down the compounds binding the fibres; for jute, bundled stems are traditionally immersed in slow-running water.

The Changthangi goat of Ladakh's high Changthang plateau, herded by the nomadic Changpa, grows a thick winter undercoat that is harvested as fine pashmina.

Pashmina is generally described as a fine subset of cashmere, roughly 12–16 microns in diameter, compared with about 12–21 microns for cashmere in general.

Retting, Britannica notes, is the fibre-separation process used for bast crops such as hemp, flax and jute.

The Changthangi pashmina goat is reported to produce some of the finest cashmere, averaging about 12–13 microns, and to account for a very small share of world cashmere output.

Lanolin, the natural wax on sheep's wool, helps sheep shed water from their fleece and protects wool and skin from the weather.

Wool can absorb large amounts of moisture vapour and release it again; merino wool has a standard moisture regain of around 17%.

A wool fibre has three main parts: an outer scaly cuticle, the inner cortex that forms most of the fibre, and in some coarser fibres a central medulla.