Towel Buying Guide

What makes a good towel and how to choose a towel can be not the easiest thing to do when there is so much available on the market. However we shouldn’t have to come out of a reviving shower or a relaxing bath having to dry ourselves in thin and horrible sandpaper like towels ever again!

You will find a lot of very cheaply priced towels often packaged as a bundle and who can blame anyone for buying them, it is appealing after all to think we have got a bargain! However, quite often these towels are very thin and made of cheap quality materials which result in a very poor absorbency, softness and of course resiliency.

The variety of materials used to make a towel is very wide however cotton being a natural, ultra absorbent fibre makes the perfect choice for towels.

We shall base our definition of a good towel on its softness, absorbency, on its ability to dry quickly and finally on its longevity. What you should consider for your towel is first of all the feel - a towel should be plush, fluffy and feel soft to the touch or if you can’t feel it (if you are buying online for example) it should look thick and full when folded as opposed to flat and thin. The second attribute you should pay attention to is the construction of the towel i.e. how the yarn has actually been made. These 3 techniques are the most common:

- Twist: the number of twists per inch of yarn, the lower the number of twist in a yarn, the plusher the towel will be.

- Combed: the cotton is combed with fine brushes to remove any remaining impurities, along with short cotton fibers resulting in longer, straighter and more lustrous cotton which makes it perfect for weaving during manufacture.

- Ring spun: the fibers are tightly twisted, compacted together to create a tougher, smoother and finer yarn. Unlike low-twist cotton, Ring spun cotton is constructed from a combination of long and short staple yarn. This method produces a more refined and softer to the touch than a basic combed cotton yarn. Ring spun cotton offers the advantages of great comfort and a durable quality.