Purpose

I love fashion, and some day I want to design my own clothes. It is important to pick an appropriate fabric. Some things that I could look at before I chose the fabric would be which one has less “wear and tear”, which one feels the best and is not itchy, and which one cleans easiest. I decided I would like to do my project on which fabric stains come clean the easiest.

I chose to do my project using these following fabrics: Cotton, Linen, Silk, Blend of Polyester/ Wool, Nylon, and Polyester.

Fabric TableFabric From CommentsCotton Cotton Boll

PlantComfortable in any

WeatherLinen Flax Plant Good in Hot Weather but

WrinklesSilk Silk Worms Smooth or Rough

Wool Animal Hair Tremendous WarmthPolyester Synthetic

FibersWrinkle- Free but Hot

Nylon Synthetic Fibers

Stretch but tears easily

Blend Synthetic Fibers

Animal Hair

Wrinkle- Free and good warmth

Hypotheses

My hypotheses is that my blend fabric will come clean the best, because it absorbed the least amount of Kool-Aid.

Procedures

Supplies List:

• Selected Fabric• Scissors• Two quarts Prepared

Cherry Kool-Aid• Laundry Soap (Tide)• Drying Rack

Step one: Cut selected fabric into six inch pieces

Step two: Soak fabric in Kool-Aid for 30 minutes

Step three: Put wet stained fabric on drying rack

Step four: Cut dry stained fabric in half

Step five: Place one half of each fabric in washer. Wash normal cycle (warm/cold)

Step six: See results

Results

Cotton, Linen, and Silk came completely clean in the wash. Nylon did not come clean at all, Polyester lightened slightly in the wash, and Wool/Polyester blend partly cleaned in the wash.

ConclusionMy hypotheses was wrong. I think that the

blend did not to come clean because of the polyester in the blend. If you look at the polyester by itself it did not change very much from the time it was on the drying rack to the end of the wash. Now I know that nylon, polyester and polyester blends are not good fabrics to use when it comes to staining with Kool-Aid. Out off all the fabrics, the wool blend absorbed the least amount of Kool-Aid and came partly clean. Perhaps a different kind of wool or wool blend may be a good choice because it is stain resistant.

Future projects could include testing Wear-and-Tear, or getting opinions on the texture of fabric.

References

• U.S. Department of Education, Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC), http://eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2/content_storage_01/0000000b/80/23/7d/ae.pdf