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Wool Batting Gone Wrong


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I have recently made a wool duvet that seems to be shedding. It was fine when originally made but is now 5 years old and seems to be breaking down. I wake up in the morning with a few strands of wool  fibers in my mouth. I notice the wool fibers are creeping out of the duvet, through the duvet cover and are floating around the room as well as they land in the closet and cover some of my clothing. I was not expecting this from the wool batting I used which is hand carded and has come from live sheep from my father's farm. Now I am asking myself if I should not have had the wool treated first before making the duvet. How can it get through the 2 layers of fabric? What would cause the batting to dislodge itself? Would washing or dry-cleaning help?  

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Is the wool batting enclosed in a second envelope that is sewn completely shut? If it isn't, but just inside the cover, there isn't enough containment to keep it from migrating out.

 

If it's in a second envelope--which your mention of "two layers" indicates is the case, and the fibers are still finding their way out, perhaps remove the batting to be used inside a new inner cover. Use high-thread-count fabric (not muslin) and sew with a short stitch length. Inspect the batting for thin spots and repair them if you can. If it won't ruin the loft, do some giant "hand quilting" or tie with sturdy thread every four to six inches apart. As with feather down that's used in feather beds and duvets in Europe, channel stitching will keep the fluff from migrating.

 

When wool batting is used in a quilt, it's stitched over and nailed down many times. If the batting is loose, stress and/or twisting of the cover will cause the fibers to come apart and migrate. Just because it was carded does not mean the fibers have attached to each other---only that they are parallel.

 

I will tell you I'm jealous that you have access to lovely wool from your family. :P   I hope you can repair the duvet so you get many more years of use from it. I believe it can be used for decades without the wool deteriorating.

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Did you, by any chance, use Legacy by Pellon Wool batting?  I don't think they sell it anymore, specifically because of this problem.  A member of the Machine Quilters Resource group had posted about extreme bearding on one of her client quilts with this batting.  She contacted Legacy and they said they had a manufacturing problem and were no longer selling it.  At the time, I had a bolt of it in my studio that I had ordered.  I called Checker Distributors and they took it back.  Unfortunately, I had tried a single batt in one of my own quilts, and it grows thinner and thinner every day.

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