Unlike when I wrote about it a few years ago, this year I have been making much more of an effort to get wool into my wardrobe. I've actually been drafting a detailed post about it for, oh, a few months, and I think it's time to dump a quick summary here, and only go into detail if there are questions.
So: what about wool? There are pros and cons.
Pros:
- Doesn't smell, even when you get sweaty wearing it
- Doesn't wrinkle (much)
- Because of 1 and 2, each item can be worn many times between washings, which:
- saves time/energy on doing laundry (both the energy of the person doing the laundry, and the literal energy resources, i.e., water, electricity)
- means items last longer
Cons:
- Cost: it ain't cheap
- Selection
- There aren't as many companies making wool clothing, which limits the available selection.
- For plus-size people, it's even more limited.
- There are fewer colors, and again, even more so for plus sizes.
- I haven't found any options with patterns. Every spill shows on solid colors!
- Boredom
- When one has a few items of clothing that can be worn more often, one does get bored with them.
- Buying online means not trying on before you buy, so it's harder to judge size and fit.
Sometimes, you can luck into a decent price on eBay or a similar site (due in part to the fact that wool items are durable enough to outlast a person's interest in wearing them, I imagine). I wanted to get a zippered, hooded wool cardigan for travel, and wow are they pricey. But I found this for under $20 including the shipping. It fits, it's in perfectly fine condition, and I do love a bargain.
Decently cozy, hood, zip, pockets, all the things I wanted at a fraction of the price. That's a solid win.
Any wool questions?
That's a huge bargain and it looks great! I've had wool sweaters and some of them are scratchy. Is that still an issue?
ReplyDeleteIt certainly can be! But these days, it's not a certainty. (If you have the budget, cashmere is lovely, and if I ever win the lottery, I'll be trying some qiviut, which I hear is fantastic.) The wool clothing that I've bought is not at all scratchy; it feels smooth, if that makes sense. This sweater is slightly scratchy, and I wouldn't want to wear it on bare skin (I tried it, and it's not awful, but I don't love the feeling). Since it's a layering piece, though, that isn't a problem.
DeleteThe major con for me is PERIMENOPAUSAL, see: HOT HOT HOT all the frickin' time. That's a great cardigan! I keep trying to switch from the fast fashion track to the 'fewer, high quality pieces' track, but the fewer pieces tend to be very pricey, and I do feel a little weird re-wearing the same thing constantly (although less and less so, if it's comfortable. )
ReplyDeleteBefore I went on hormone therapy, I did a lot of layers-on, layers-off as I hot flashed, so I get that! Wool does a good job of temperature regulation, but I'm not suggesting you pile it on. I hear you on the re-wearing, too; we're used to changing outfits so often that it feels funny not to. I tell myself that I'm in a Jane Austen novel, wearing my favorite dresses a lot. I used to think that was gross, how often they would wear the same thing, but really with wool it isn't, the way it would be for cotton and the like.
DeleteI'm loving the fact that I have a gray wool sweater that I bought on ebay with a patterned panel that is a lot like yours. Twins! Almost. Sort of. Close enough. But yeah, I've got a bunch of cashmere sweaters that I bought over the years at $10 or so. Most of them were, as far as I can tell, because the original owner dutifully sent them to the drycleaners, where they lost their softness, so what was the point anymore?
ReplyDeleteBut all you have to do is carefully handwash them in lukewarm water, no agitation, all this stuff you and I already know, lay it out to dry, and the drycleaning chemicals wash away and the cashmere feels like cashmere again. At worst it takes doing that twice.