MENS CASUAL VESTS – COTTON             WOMENS VESTS – FABRIC – COTTON

These are the words many people use to find my site right now. I have some 65 cotton vests from which to choose listed under: Cotton Vests

It’s that time of the year!   The mercury is rising and we are shedding coats and jackets in favor of cooler clothing. The fabric we all seem to select is cotton.  Why Cotton?

Unlike other fibers,  the center of the cotton fiber can absorb moisture .  This makes cotton clothing feel cooler in the summer because it wicks moisture away from the wearer’s skin.  We often use the phrase “it breathes”.   Not only is cotton is soft, strong, light weight and absorbent but it will take dye readily, resulting in the many vibrant colors that are available in my catalog. Cotton has played such a big part in every person’s wardrobe because not only is it soft and beautiful, but it happens to be easy to care for.

How do all of these wonderful qualities come about?

The cotton plant is two to five feet tall and has spreading branches containing one to several buds Seeds are planted in the spring, emerge from the ground shortly afterwards and three weeks later the buds turn into creamy white flowers for  an eight week period.  Each flower has five petals surrounded by leaflike structures called bracts. The petals fall and the seed pod that develops is about the size of a walnut   In six to nine weeks the pod dries and splits open revealing a boll with 20 to 40 seeds buried within. In a hot climate this adds up to about 150 to 200 days from planting to harvest.

Every part of the cotton plant is useful. The lint (white fluffy part) is spun into yarn that is used to make cotton clothing, padding, coffee filters, and even explosives. The seeds are crushed to extract cottonseed oil (used for cooking).  The remaining leaves and stalks are plowed into the soil for fertilizer or fed to livestock as a roughage addition to their regular diet.

I picked a cotton boll once and tried to pick out the seeds.  They were so tangled within the fibers that it was almost impossible to remove them. Prior to 1800 these seeds must have been removed manually (though I can’t imagine how) so that the fibers could be used. Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin in 1794 which revolutionized the cotton industry by removing the seeds mechanically.  His machine did the work of 50 people working by hand.

All of this happened right before the Civil War and we all know that enslaved African Americans picked the cotton and hauled it in huge gunny sacks through the fields in the hot sun. British traders purchased cotton from the plantations in the south and “King Cotton” had become the backbone of the southern American economy  providing capital for the continuing development of the North.  Growing and harvesting cotton holds an important place in the history of our country.

Cotton was picked by hand as late as the 1900′s and is still hand picked in developing countries.

Now it is harvested mechanically in the United States and we are still the largest exporter of raw cotton. Texas, California, and Georgia and Mississippi (in that order) are the leading producers.

The largest producers of cotton today are China and India and it  is used by their textile industries.

Cotton is an interesting topic and I have only touched the surface. Farmers, manufacturers, and scientists are working to solve the problems that still face the cotton industry.