Linen Flax Combed Top Roving Blue Bayou

Linen is made from the Flax Plant, Linum usitatissimum.  The plant is multipurpse providing both flax seeds for food and linen for fabric.  Flax was first domesticated in ancient Mesopotamia and has been used as wrappings for mummies, burial shrouds, and every day clothing.  It is a long stapled fiber.

Flax has a 100 day growing period and needs a nutrient heavy soil and can deplete the soil if grown in the same field year after year.  At the end of the growing season the flax is cut and laid to dry for a few days before the seeds are removed.  It is then retted using one of several methods to decompose unwanted parts of the plant: laying in field to be exposed to weather, wetting it in a pond or retaining basin, or under the running water of a stream.

After the retting process flax is dried.  Then it is through a process of braking and scutching in which the unwanted plant material is removed from the linen. The final step is to run the linen through a hackle of metal combs to align the fibers and remove smaller plant materials.

Staple length approximately 6 inches or 15 centimeters.
4 Ounces