Anyone who works with French draping knows that in order to use the technique we need to be careful, such as marking the mannequin, marking the canvas and, of course, choosing and preparing the fabric, right?
When I started teaching draping online, through free content and the Secrets of French draping course, I came into contact with different profiles of students: professionals, sewing lovers who made the pieces as a hobby, fashion students…
In addition, the launch of some classes coincided with the lockdows we were experiencing in 2020 and as many students could not leave their homes, or even, to save fabric, many did the exercises with non woven.
So I had the opportunity to closely follow the work of many of these students, and after seeing the result, I started to “free” the use of non woven, but I always like to make some reservations.
Well, to begin with, first of all you should know what non woven is and its technical characteristics, so that you can understand why it is not the best option for draping.
non wovenis the acronym for non-woven fabric, in addition it has other names, including in other languages: nonwoven (English), notejido (Spanish), tessuto nontessuto (Italian), nontissé (French) and vliesstoffe (German).
Non woven is characterized as a flat, flexible and porous structure, consisting of a veil or blanket of fibers or filaments.
This structure can be made by a mechanical (friction), chemical (adhesion) or thermal (cohesion) process, or by a combination of two or three processes.
The result is as satisfying as the fabrics obtained using cotton, with the same quality and softness. It can be produced from PET bottle.
Obtaining the product, based on recyclables, makes the production process sustainable.
If you are curious or curious like me, and would like to know a little more about the history, know that there is no exact date for the start of manufacture. Scholars claim that non-woven fabric originated in Egypt around 2400 BC. Starting in the 1930s, in the United States, non-woven fabrics from cellulose began to be manufactured.
Around 1957, a structure similar to non woven began to be manufactured on equipment in the paper industry.
The 60's marks the launch of non-woven fabric on the market as an industrial raw material and as a consumer product. The first patents appear and, in the 70's, the industry dominates the technologies and popularizes the non-woven fabric.
Taking all these factors into account, note that non woven does not have weft and warp, as well as traditional fabric, so this is the feature that gets in the way a little when making the patterns, especially when making the notches on the canvas.
Another characteristic that you can observe is the raw material of non-woven. It can be made from several materials, such as cotton and polyester, but we know that polyester is not the best option to work with draping, in the same way the non woven made of synthetic, This fact ends up harming the quality of the fabric, but nothing that doesn't prevent you from testing eventually for studies, but always taking into account these items I mentioned here!
Research source: https://trisoft.com.br/tnt-o-que-e-o-tecido-nao-tecido-e-qual-utilizacao