Washing & Laundry Symbols Explained

At Cashmere & Cotton we don’t believe in throwaway fashion, our cashmere is made to last a lifetime and with a little love and care, it can. We want to help you get the most out of your cashmere clothing; whether it’s your favourite go-to wardrobe staple or those easy to throw on accessories that you just can’t live without.

The care label in any garment is where you'll find recommended laundry symbols, but what do these actually mean? We've popped together a helpful guide for when you're washing your clothes by machine or hand.

What do washing symbols mean?

Washing instructions for cashmere can vary due to different grades and knitting tensions so we always advise to take a look at the care label symbols and carefully read all the information given; you will find this inside your piece of cashmere knitwear. On this clothing label there will be a group of laundry symbols dedicated to clothing care, which will let you know the best way to look after your item of clothing and keep it looking it's best.

Washing labels

The clothes washing symbols on the care label will let you know if the item needs to be machine or hand washed, the wash cycle and what temperature to use. The washing machine symbols commonly used are; Machine washable, Wash cold (30 degrees), wash warm (40 degrees), wash hot (60 degrees), synthetics cycle, gentle/wool wash cycle, hand wash, do not wash and do not wring.

Our cashmere can be hand washed but is also machine washable and we recommend a gentle machine cycle such as a wool wash or a delicate cycle, a maximum temperature of 30 degrees, using a specialist cashmere detergent and no fabric conditioner. You will see two washing symbols on our washing labels; the gentle/wool wash cycle which looks like a bucket filled with water and two lines underneath and the hand wash symbol which looks like a bucket filled with water and a hand. For full instructions on washing your cashmere read our guide how to wash cashmere.

Tumble drying symbols

Once you have washed your piece of cashmere next in the laundry process is drying. To determine the best way to dry your clothes without causing any shrinkage or damage, look for the drying symbol on your garment. The common drying symbols you will see are; tumble dry allowed and the heat setting, this is a circle within a square with a number of dots inside, permanent press/ Synthetics, Delicate/Gentle or do not tumble dry.

Here at cashmere and cotton we recommend laying our items flat or rolling in a dry towel. We do not recommend the garment is put in a tumble dryer this is shown on the care label by the use of the do not tumble dry symbol, which is a square with a circle inside and a cross through it.

Ironing symbols

Our most hated chore, ironing! We advise to always read the label for the recommend heat setting to avoid any disasters; this will be shown as an iron with number of dots or for do not iron an iron with a cross through.

When it comes to ironing our cashmere, we recommend steaming with a steam iron as opposed to ironing flat, which may cause the natural pile of the yarns to be crushed. This is depicted on our care label as the cool iron symbol, which is an iron with one dot in the middle; meaning a maximum of 110 degrees.

Dry clean symbols

For those of you who would rather a professional dry cleaner handle the laundering of your cashmere, look for the dry cleaning symbols; these will help you to make the decision on whether the item should go to the dry cleaners and what solvent they should use. Common dry cleaning symbols you will see are; dry clean only, any solvent, any solvent except trichloroethylene, petroleum solvent only and do not dry clean.

Our cashmere can be dry-cleaned and on our care label will show the circle with a P in the middle, which means dry clean with any solvent except Trichloroethylene.

Bleaching symbols

If you need any information on bleaching look for the triangle symbol. Bleaching symbols consist of a triangle with a cross through it for do not bleach, a triangle with diagonal lines for use of non-chlorine bleach or just a triangle for bleaching allowed.

We advise to not use bleach on any of our cashmere, this is depicted in the symbol that looks like a triangle with a cross through it.