Your Sweater Should Be Itchy
You know the feeling. You’re shrugging on a thick wool sweater, thinking it’s cozy time. And then it absolutely is not. You can feel the rough yarn scratching your skin as you twist one shoulder up and then the other, in a feeble attempt to smooth out the seams and curb the itch. Maybe it’s not even so bad, just a slight twitch here and there, but the persistent tingle gently forces awareness, like a pebble in a shoe or small nick from a shaving razor. And it lasts. All. Day.
You may not like it, but this is peak sweater performance; This is exactly how a wool sweater ought to feel.
Now, there are exceptions to every rule. But as a general point of order, thicker wool is just about always itchy unless it’s processed with chemicals or blended with inorganic fibers like acrylic and nylon. This does not necessarily denote quality, either: You can find plenty of ”high-end” sweaters that interweave man-made and natural fibers for the sake of durability or handfeel. Similarly, you can find plenty of “affordable” sweaters that’re 100-percent wool. There are different tiers of fabrics and not all textiles are created equal — there are higher end nylons and cheaper nylons, for instance. But you can trust that if a lower-priced 100-percent wool sweater feels gentle, it was almost assuredly processed quite roughly. Plus, not every inorganic blend softens a sweater; sometimes they’re utilized for the sake of cost efficiency and only make the garment feel worse.
This is why you want an itchy wool sweater, because you should want something organic, something real. Itchier wool sweaters come with benefits, too. They resist water more easily, due to the water-repelling properties of lanolin, a waxy substance that sheep secrete to protect their wool. They’re also often warmer than finer wool sweaters because they’re often quite coarse, the same factor contributing to their itchiness. Plus, these thicker sweaters will likely soften with washes and wear (the lanolin will also wash away), gently shaping to better fit your body.
The itchy sweater has its place. But not all sweaters must be itchy, per se. You do have some agency. Brandon Soffer, who works at one of SoHo’s oldest boutiques and sold hundreds of sweaters over the years, explains: “Untreated and natural wool can be itchy. Merinos, alpacas, yaks, angoras, and cashmeres are typically very soft and smooth.”
And if you really want to get nerdy about your wool, you should know that its processing matters as much as the material itself. Virgin wool — wool sourced from a sheep’s very first shearing — is usually knitted into soft sweaters but it can also be formed into tough outerwear, as Yohji Yamamoto often does with his signature densely-woven wool gabardine. The only consistency here is that virgin wool, like quality cashmere — which is also a type of wool! — will cost you.
“Wool is quite diverse,” Soffer continues. “So while a knit cashmere sweater might be very soft and feel nice on the skin, a wool tweed, which is a woven fabric, might feel very coarse and structured. I prefer itchy, untreated wools for outerwear and trousers, whereas for knits I want very soft and durable yarn.”
That’s the trick. So often, consumers make the mistake of believing that touch tells the entire story, but especially when it comes to organic fibers, that’s not always the case. A seemingly soft wool sweater may be hiding polymers waiting to be absorbed into your skin. A chunky, skin-scraping sweater is the closest thing to just wearing a sheep. And isn’t that worth suffering a little itch?
