From fields to people: how cotton is grown and processed into garments

The journey of cotton starts with its cultivation, mainly in regions with warm climates. Key stages include:

• Planting: Farmers meticulously prepare the soil and plant cotton seeds during the appropriate season.

• Growth and Maintenance: Successful cotton growth requires a frost-free period, abundant sunshine, and moderate rainfall. Farmers carefully monitor plant growth, remove weeds, and protect the crops from pests and diseases.

• Harvesting: After the plant has been defoliated and the bolls have cracked open to reveal the lint, the cotton is ready to be harvested, either by hand or using mechanical equipment.

Following the harvest, cotton undergoes several processing stages to ready it for fabric production:

• Ginning: The first step is ginning, which separates cotton fibers from seeds and plant debris using a cotton gin machine.

• Cleaning: The cotton is then cleaned to remove impurities such as dirt, leaves, and small particles, using various machines like cleaners and carding machines.

• Carding and Combing: Carding straightens and aligns the fibers for spinning. Combing, an optional step, further refines the fibers by removing shorter ones and ensuring uniformity.

This detailed process underscores the complexity and effort involved in transforming raw cotton into the fabrics that are integral to our daily lives.

Once cotton fibers are processed, they undergo several steps to be transformed into fabrics:

• Spinning: Cotton fibers are spun into yarns using spinning machines, which twist the fibers together to create continuous strands of yarn.

• Weaving or Knitting: The yarns are then woven or knitted into fabric. Weaving involves interlacing the yarns in a crisscross pattern, creating a stable fabric structure, while knitting uses loops of yarn to produce a more flexible and stretchable fabric.

• Finishing: The woven or knitted fabric undergoes finishing processes such as washing, bleaching, dyeing, and printing to enhance its appearance, texture, and color.

The finished fabric ends up in the skilled hands of tailors and seamstresses, who cut it into pattern pieces and sew together to create garments, or other textile products, which are then labelled, marketed and sold to customers all over the world!

After decades in the fashion world, in 2018, we have created the Manteco Academy project, through which we  give webinars, in-person lessons and workshops on eco-design, circular economy and sustainability to numerous fashion schools, technical universities and brands worldwide. Thanks to this educative commitment and our heritage, we are often invited as guest speaker at events, panels, podcasts and conferences about sustainable fashion and circular economy.