Random: knit vs woven--definition please!

[lilpritch04]

OK, so my mom and I were talking clothes yesterday and now I'm all confused. I have quite a few work shirts--button down blouses that are 98% cotton and 2% spandex. I have always thought these were woven shirts but she insists that they are knit because they stretch. I thought that knit and woven refer to how they are made and I don't understand why a blended shirt could not be a woven shirt.

I could be very very wrong on this. I'm OK with that. I just want to know what the difference is.

Another example: my mom says that jeans are woven and T-shirts are knit. We are both OK on this. But then I ask about my jeans that have a little stretch to them from the spandex--now she says that they are a knit. Huh?

Can someone please explain this?

 

[KM2004]

oh man, this brings back memories. I used to work in a material testing place that tested shirts, pants, costumes (for Disney, once), fabric (etc...) before they go on sale (for pilling, colorfastness, button strength, etc...)

Anyway, I don't remember everything but...

Knits strech both ways while wovens, I think, only stretch one way, if at all. Also, knits, if you look very closley, have a V shaped pattern. Wovens are, well, woven.

Jeans are woven. The jeans with lycra i'm not sure about...man, I knew all this too.

I guess i'm not too much help. T shirts are knits. Sweaters are woven (I think)....sorry for confusing you more!

If you really need to know, PM me and i'll get you some more info.

 

[KathyTX]

You are correct.

Wovens can stretch a bit if a stretchy material like Lycra is part of the fiber...

The fact that it stretches doesn't make it a knit. Here are diagrams and definitions of knits vs. wovens:

The one on the left is a diagram of woven fabric. Woven fabric is made on a loom, with threads going up and down - the warp threads, and threads going across from side to side, the weft threads. What you have is crisscross of independent threads which go over and under one another in various combinations. Plain weave is a fabric where one cross thread goes over one lengthwise thread, then goes under the next thread, then goes over the top of the next, and so on. Some woven fabrics vary this and the threads may go over two, then under one, over two, under one. These different combinations make up a different surface texture to the fabric. But all woven fabrics share the basic element: i.e. threads crossing over and under one another.

Knitted fabrics, on the other hand, are put together in an entirely different manner. They are held on knitting needles and stitches are formed, which are all interlinking. What you have is the diagram on the right above. Each stitch is suspended from the one above and you get distinct vertical rows in the fabric. Rather than going over and under one another, these threads hang from one another.

This difference makes a knit fabric behave very differently from a woven fabric. The biggest difference is that knit fabrics usually have stretch which is built into them by the construction process. Usually the stretch is across the fabric, as in t-shirt knits. But the new fabric technology is producing fabrics which have vertical stretch as well, and now stretch in all four directions: up, down, across and on the diagonal. This stretch is the first thing which tells us that the fabric is a knit. However, some knits have very little stretch and you may get confused and think they are not knits. Some heavy polar fleeces fall into this category. And now we are getting an entirely new breed of fabrics, wovens with lycra added to make them stretch wovens. Just in case you weren't confused enough. For our purposes, we will consider stretch wovens to be woven fabrics, rather than knits.

 

[RNMOM]

I think jeans and shirts that have spandex are simply "woven" with spandex fibers replacing some of the cotton fibers, hence are woven.

Knits can be cotton, blends, wool, etc. There are flat knits, textured knits, "Pique" knits (I think that is how it is spelled on Lands End).

So, now you have...MHO.

 

[lilpritch04]

Wow that is a lot of information to digest! I think I understand now.
Thanks!
Katie Mae

 

[KristaTX]

I was in Ross the other day and was wondering this exact same thing. They have different sections for knits and for wovens.

And wow, Kathy! . Little did I know that your company makes sure employees are experts on EVERYTHING about the business .

 

[KathyTX]

Originally posted by KristaTX
And wow, Kathy! . Little did I know that your company makes sure employees are experts on EVERYTHING about the business .

LOL, Krista!

Actually, all I know is how to do a Google search!