Everybody wears cotton clothing – babies are popped into it from birth because of its softness, its breathability and the way that it can take heavy laundering (therefore its absolute cleanliness can be guaranteed). Baby clothing is, quintessentially, cotton clothing.

Once we grow up we move into the kind of rugged cotton clothes that our mothers can wash and wash and wash – whether it’s sports gear for the budding footballer or gymnast, or short-sleeved T-shirts for the incipient artist or junior trainspotter. This cotton wear is wash-and-wear style, in bright colours and is often the kind of garment that a child will fall in love with and insist on wearing all the time. It’s a good thing it’s tough!

And as we become adults, we moving into our own fashion preferences: brilliant white shirts worn for interviews, brand new black T-shirts to impress the opposite sex at the weekend, comfy hoodies for weekend meet ups.

Caring for Cotton

While cotton is robust, you can do quite a lot to keep it looking better for longer. Deep colours benefit from being washed inside out – especially if they have transfer designs on them. Light colours take almost any amount of laundering, but be careful not to wash them with anything dark, or they are likely to pick up a tint of the darker colour.

Cotton or Poly-cotton?

The choice isn’t as simple as you might think. Pure cotton has advantages – it becomes more comfortable the more it’s worn, and you can iron it on a very high heat without destroying it. It holds its dye colour well too. On the down side, it does crease quite badly.

Poly-cotton doesn’t crease nearly so badly, but it does have a tendency to pill, which is where the fabric makes tiny bobbles over time. Also it can’t be washed on as high a temperature as 100% cotton can.