In my daily work, I often meet customers who need to purchase Egyptian cotton towels, but they don’t know what is Egyptian cotton. Don’t worry, if you also want to know about it, please allow me to introduce what is long staple cotton first.
According to Chinese standards, long staple cotton refers to cotton with a cotton fiber length greater than 33mm. Its fiber is long enough and strong, which woven cloth with luster, like silk.
Compare the picture below and you will know the difference: the fiber of ordinary cotton is too short!
There are only a handful of cotton varieties that can be called long staple cotton in the world, all of which are cross-breeding products called Gossypium barbadense sea island cotton, and must be picked manually in order not to damage its fiber structure. The best products such as West Indian Sea Island Cotton (WISIC), Indian SUVIN cotton, Egyptian cotton GIZA 45:
- West Indian Sea Island Cotton is the panda in cotton. It’s an absolutely rare species, only accounts for 0.00004% of the world’s production, and will only be used to make men’s high-definition shirts. No one will be extravagant to use it for bedding and towels.
- India’s SUVIN long-staple cotton has a smaller output, which is a domestic tribute in India and is hard to export.
- GIZA Egyptian cotton, with GIZA 45 as the best quality, its output only accounts for 0.4% of the Egyptian GIZA -grade cotton output, but it is a little more than West Indian sea island cotton, so there are still some that will be used for top-quality Egyptian cotton sheets.
- In addition, the slightly shorter American PIMA cotton and Xinjiang long-staple cotton are actually very cost-effective, they are widely used in various high-end textile fields, and the length is about 38mm.
Now, let’s talk about GIZA Egyptian cotton, hope this can help you, my friend.
Because there are too many fake and inferior products of GIZA Egyptian cotton, the Egyptian Cotton Association made a global trademark in 2000:
Only the long staple cotton with this trademark can be guaranteed to be grown in Egypt and picked purely by hand, without any machine harvesting or other chemical contaminants.
Moreover, these high-quality long staple cottons will be classified by the Cotton Association with GIZA numbers. Different GIZA grades represent different Egyptian cotton qualities:
Among them, Egyptian cotton GIZA 45 is the top. This No. 45 cotton only accounts for 0.4% of the total output of Egyptian long staple cotton. It can be said to be very scarce, only produced in a specific area, the green delta at the end of the Nile.
Here is the mouth of the Nile River, with constant humidity and high heat, sufficient sunlight, very suitable for the growth of cotton, it is a perfect natural cotton irrigation system! Good quantity, low output, and high demand directly lead to the extremely high price of GIZA 45, the price of it is 4 times of ordinary Egyptian cotton.
1. Hand-picking and combing
In order to ensure the fiber length and maturity of cotton, Egyptian long-staple cotton is picked and carded by hand, so that it can be more intuitive to distinguish the maturity of cotton, avoid mechanical harvesting damage, and obtain thin and long cotton fibers.
2. No harmful substances
Ordinary cotton is picked by machine and is dirty. It needs to be bleached with chemical reagents. The strength of the cotton becomes weaker and the internal structure is also damaged, making the fabric harder and less luster as it is washed.
Egyptian long-staple cotton has good cleanliness, is not contaminated by machines, and does not require various chemical reagents for bleaching. The structure of the cotton is not destroyed, so it has no harmful substances. Even after washing many times, it will not become hard and soft as before.
3. The fiber is thin, long, and high in strength.
Egyptian long-staple cotton is a long and thin body. As mentioned above, GIZA 45 has the longest fiber in cotton that can be made into Egyptian cotton bath sheets in the world.
The fineness is determined by the Micronaire. Micronaire is the diameter of cotton fiber, it represents the maturity of cotton. Many kinds of cotton have low Micronaire, which means that they are too thin and the maturity is not good, and the strength will be below.
Under normal circumstances, the Micronaire of good cotton is between 3.7-4.2. If it is lower than 3.4, it is considered inferior and not mature enough.
The biggest advantage of Giza is that it has low Micronaire (fine fiber), good maturity, and high strength. Giza45’s Micronaire is only 2.69, but its strength is as high as 44.3!
In our national standard of long staple cotton, if the strength value exceeds 38, it will be regarded as a first-class product.
Therefore, for the same yarn count, Egyptian long staple cotton can be spun into more fibers than ordinary cotton. The yarn has high strength, good resilience, and better abrasion resistance:
For ordinary cotton spinning, if it exceeds 150 yarns, it must be mixed with Egyptian long-staple cotton, otherwise the strength is not enough and it is easy to break. This is why the high-count and high-density Egyptian cotton sheets you see say that they “use Egyptian cotton” because they have to use it.
4. Smooth as silk
The Micronaire is low, the uniformity is good, and the strength is high, which makes the yarn woven from it very fine. Basically, the yarn can be used directly without plying. After mercerizing, the fabric is smooth as silk.
Any strong fabric manufacturer will have its own series of 100 Egyptian cotton sheets. Especially GIZA45, with it, you can basically indicate that you are the Hermes of the fabric industry, with extraordinary taste.
As far as I know, there are only two or three best Egyptian cotton sheets brands in the world. And the prices are very high. For example, Sferra has a 100% GIZA 45 series.
In fact, used in ordinary home textile products, GIZA 86 is already good, and our factory is also importing it to make Egyptian cotton towel sets, which are well received by customers for their outstanding performance.
According to my industry experience, there are three ways to guarantee:
The above viewpoints are daily summaries. If there are any errors, please correct them. We look forward to creating beautiful sparks with your views and making progress together!