Wonderful Wool~Part One

Once you’ve discovered the dangers of plastic playthings, your mission is to explore suitable substitutes and bring together a collection of toys, books and cuddly things that aren’t toxic or bad for the planet in a whole other way.  There’s no getting around it, if you are going to create a playscape free of toxic substances, you have to take an interest in material science.

This means educating yourself about the properties of substitute materials as well as how they are recovered from Nature and made into a particular product, and, beyond this, how that product is eventually brought to market. If all of this seems daunting, my advice is to start with a sure bet. . . what I call “wonderful wool.”

Introducing your child to this amazing material and its broad range of fun uses links them to a tradition that began before recorded history, when animal fibers were fashioned into garments that kept our ancestors warm and (no doubt) lifted their spirits as creative playthings.

This eco-friendly material is biodegradable and renewable. When the animals who provide it are raised sustainably, their droppings are used to increase the fertility of soil, which in turn increases the soil’s capacity to fix carbon.

Wool as a general material classification includes fibers sourced from a variety of animals, most often sheep and goats but also rabbits and a class of animals called camelids, which includes llamas, alpacas, guanacos and vicuñas. The vicuna is known as the “bearer of the golden fleece” because it produces the most luxurious wool fiber known to humankind.  Wool is also obtained from yaks, muskoxen, buffalo and even possums.

Because it ignites at a higher temperature than cotton and most synthetic fibers, wool has lower rates of flame spread and heat release. It does not melt or drip and is self-extinguishing, making it safer for clothing and flooring products like carpet. These properties make wool the material of choice for high safety environments like planes and trains as well as for garments worn by firefighters and soldiers.

As for durability, the American Wool Council claims that wool fibers can bend up to 20,000 times before breaking. Not sure how they figure that out, but, I’ll take them at their word.