Assignment 4 - Baby Clothing

Today we are going to present a piece of baby clothing – namely baby leggings.

Style

The piece is from the autumn/winter collection of H&M, size EUR 74 and is suitable for both baby boys and baby girls.

The leggings look quite thick, therefore durable and warm. Furthermore, they have very soft and nice to skin feel, they are stretchy and comfortable. 

In order to understand if the materials we are investigating are fitted for children’s wear, we will also briefly look into the needed properties of children’s wear.

Strong and durable materials - First of all the materials need to be strong. Children play around and use their body a lot and this means the materials need to be able to be used a lot around playground etc. 

No discomfort for the child - Comfort is main priority when it comes to children’s wear. The design often more secondary to a child than clothes for adults. It is important that there are no bulky seams, button or anything that might cause discomfort. 

Harmful materials, treatments or pieces - An other important factor for children’s wear is that the materials and treatments are all environmental friendly and don’t harm the child skin or even if the child put any parts of the garment in their mouth. Drawstrings can also be very harmful to children and should for young kids be totally avoided. The strings around the neck can get caught on playground etc. and cause strangulations. Strings on the legs can get caught in car and bus doors. 

Choking hazards - Also we need to look at if there are any detachable parts on the garments. Investigate if there is anything that can be detached from the garment and end up choke the child if they eat it. Snaps, buttons, zipper heads, bows, rhinestones and other decorative appliques are all a concern. Shoelaces, ribbons and other dangling clothing attachments can also be harmful. Velcro is a much safer alternative for securing shoes on small children. 

Function in focus - Designing children’s wear it is important to look at the function of the garment and then work around that. If it is for children wearing diaper it needs to be taken in consideration. Also it needs to be easy to get over the head of the child. It is also important the it is easy to wash because in many families with small children, they often have a lot of laundry and they need clothes that can handle most kinds of treatments and washing. 

Construction - Loose knitted fabrics and loose threads can wrap around a baby and pose a risk of circulation being cut off. Because of this tightly woven garments are to be preferred. 

Composition

Cotton (40%) - We know the properties of cotton from previous presentations. But in short words, cotton is a good choice when producing children’s wear, mainly because of its softness. Also, cotton is non-allergenic and this makes it a good choice for children suffering from asthma, allergies or sensitive skin. The fabric is further more durable and easy to care for which are both factors we have previously established to be important when making children's wear.

Polyamide (30%) - (it is found in the elastic band of the leggings for example).

Polyamide can occur both naturally and artificially. Polyamide fibers are primarily used for clothing, in stockings and tights, lingerie, corsetry as well as sports- and swimwear. It is a type of Nylon fiber. 

· Polyamide fibers are very durable strong and resistant to abrasion 

· They have high elasticity 

· They are light and fine 

· They are easy to wash and quick-drying 

· Polyamide fibers guarantee shape retention

· Flame Retardant (Good properties for childrens wear) 

Viscose - (25%) Viscose is created from natural fibrеs, most often made from wood and then go through a man made process that makes them ready for spinning. Viscose has a silky feel, and is used extensively for clothing manufacture. Though it breathes like cotton and has a good drape, it can wrinkle easily and shrink in hot water. 

Angora - (5%) - The Angora fibers come from either a Angora cat, rabbit or goat. The fiber is hollow, giving it insulating properties. Because it is about seven times warmer than sheep's wool, it is usually blended with other fibers, such as wool or silk. The angora wool has a huge “fluff-factor”.

Angora yarn is exceptionally comfortable to wear next to the skin, not being at all itchy or scratchy and is usually suitable even for those with the most delicate of skins.

Angora wool is sometimes left in its natural color, but can be hand dyed. Its superior quality can also be demonstrated with its ability to retain dye color permanently over all other types of wool fibers. Angora wool can also be mixed when knitted into clothing, with other soft fibers. 

The Angora is rather expensive and this is why H&M are using other blends as well, to minimize the costs. 

Blending

The reason behind blending these very different materials is that they all provide new important qualities to the final baby piece. Polyamide makes the piece extra durable. Together with the reduced amount of cotton, they make the piece light, easy to wash and dry. The viscose and angora bring soft, silky touch. Furthermore, the angora gives a great insulation.

Structure

The piece is made out of one of the most basic knitted fabrics called Stockinette stitch (Interlock). Stockinette-stitch is very smooth and each column (wale) resembles a stacked set of "V"'s.

Tests

1. We have tested the durability of the fabric with the bursting test (ISO 13938-2 1999 test method).

The result was about 284 kPa which is a great result for the strength of the material and proves its durability. 

2. We have tested the colour fastness to washing in accordance to ISO 105-C06 C15.

Even though the washing instruction states 30 degrees, we have tested the colour fastness to 40 and 60 degrees.

In both cases we got great results - grade 5. The colours remained exactly the same no matter of the temperature. Furthermore, what really surprised us, was the fact that the fabric did not schrink at all even though angora tends to shrink at higher temperature.

3. We have tested the fabric propensity to pilling in accordance to ISO 12945-1 and ISO 129452.

The result we have got after the visual assessment is Grade 3 - Moderate surface fuzzing and/or moderate pilling.

Care instructions

Conclusion

In general our piece got all the necessary properties to become a good children’s wear:

• It is soft and nice to wear and warm with good insulation.

• There are no dangerous parts except the string on the waist, but it is acceptable as long as it is not in the lower leg or neck.

• It is easy to wash but we assume that the tumble dry option is quite necessary too.

• It is made out of strong materials and there was no great changes in the pilling test.