On our recent trip to China we met with our knitwear supplier and got a behind the scenes look at garments being made. From yarn arriving at the mill in its raw form all the way to finished product, below is a little visual diary of our trip.
First Stop UPW our yarn mill in Dongguan, China.
UPW are an extremely socially responsible company, with a true commitment to environmental protection and sustainability, throughout the production process.
Yarn fibres arrive in their raw form from dye house in bags. Fibres such as our cashmere and cotton are then blended together.
This process is called carding, where fibres start to take shape into yarn. A Spinning Mule then twists the yarns together, before being spun onto cones.
All yarns are knitted to ensure smoothness before shipped to knitting factory.
Next stop a 30 min drive to our Knitting factory - I’m here with owner and friend Raymond.
The cones from the yarn mill are feed into a knitting machine to make garment pieces. QC checks are done at several stages of production - here all pieces are inspected for tension or faults.
Pieces need to be linked together by a highly skilled linker, it can take up to 20min for a basic style to link each piece into a whole garment. Each garment is then checked before being sent for washing.
After washing, every garment is ironed followed by more QC, finishing touches and labels are added before being sent for a final press and sent off to be packed.
Our Cotton Cashmere Crew is available via subscription for all of May or as a one of purchase through our online store. For some video footage, check out the saved stories on the Asuwere instagram page.
Enjoy