Washing cashmere: do or don’t?

Have you ever seen a sheep or a goat washing itself with shampoo? The idea alone! Pretty funny, then, that humans are the only “animals” that use soap products. By now we are so accustomed here that we don’t consider something clean until there is a cleaning product involved.

From this idea, we want to give you a little break: it is best for your cashmere scarf to make it
not
wash. Not with water, not with soap, preferably not at all! Cashmere is a natural product. The goat hair is naturally grease and water repellent.

Why should you wash cashmere products?

A healthy cashmere goat stays fresh from living outdoors and by shaking out extensively on a regular basis. A rain shower on occasion completes the cleaning routine. And that is all it takes To keep goat hair fresh and fruity. The same is actually true of products made from this goat hair.

But we are not goats, are we? We wear perfume and hairspray, a gust of wind causes the scarf to accidentally blow against our pink lipstick or we spill our French cheese on it when our motor skills deteriorate after a pleasant drink on the terrace. No matter how sweet you want to be to your cashmere scarf, as a human being, you have to give your cashmere products a break every now and then. But how?

Daily cleaning of cashmere

How “dirty” is your scarf? Remove sand, dust and crumbs from your scarf by shaking it out outside. For animal hair and small impurities in the scarf, we like to work with a special cashmere comb. The cashmere comb From Niche Beauty is a very nice one. An ordinary traditional clothes brush or lint brush also works well. We do not use sticky rollers on cashmere.

Are you bothered by smoke or other odors? Mother Nature makes those disappear simply by hanging your scarf outside in the wind overnight. If you want something more than freshening up, hang your scarf in the bathroom while you take a hot shower. Steaming causes the fibers to expand a bit and softens the stain on your scarf. After steaming, gently pat the entire surface with a clean cloth and rub out all the dirt.

What products do I wash cashmere with?

Slightly more vicious spots? Then place the scarf in a tub of lukewarm water. This may soften the stain. After this, you will treat the stain or stains in a targeted manner. Take a few drops of detergent and gently lather it on the stain by rubbing gently. You take a ph-neutral detergent for this!

Although you will discover plenty of fine cashmere laundry products on the Internet, we believe that a simple ph-neutral shampoo (which is at least five times cheaper) will produce equally good results.

Can cashmere go in the washing machine?

Find us a tricky one. Some owners of our
Backbone products
do wash their cashmere scarves periodically in a washing machine. On a short program and a low temperature – ranging from cold to 30 degrees.

Nevertheless, we recommend
we
it not to. We value the most sustainable life possible for your cashmere scarf. You maximize that by washing sparingly. So as far as we are concerned, always clean cashmere by hand. Then you can see exactly when the spots are out of the scarf. In this process, the fibers are not under the pressure of friction any longer than absolutely necessary. Longer washing or spinning does not necessarily make the scarf cleaner but it does make it more vulnerable to pilling and fluffing.

After reading this blog, do you have a specific question about cleaning cashmere? Or do you have a good tip you’d like to pass along to Backbone? We would love to hear about it! Send us an email, or send a dm via Instagram or Facebook.