Superwash Wool vs. Cotton for potholders

[thesuburbs]

Odd that I have been knitting this long and never made a potholder, but I found that amazing Star Trek potholder pattern (http://offthehookastronomy.blogspot.com/2009/08/star-trek-pot-holders-free-pattern.html) and want to make one or two for myself and my BF as a housewarming gift to ourselves. (We're moving from a studio to a 1-bedroom in a few

Comments

[weezer140]

Wool is a better insulator than cotton. I use both cotton and wool for potholders. Your superwash should be just fine, but I would recommend a tight gauge.

[mremre]

I have always wondered this as well. Is wool more flammable than cotton, for example? LOL

[islandofwords]

Wool is quite flame resistant, actually. It's self-extinguishing.

[mwknitter]

Nope - wool gets charred where touched by a flame but goes out immediately by itself. Cotton will burn. I've actually read that it can flare up like a torch.

[weezer140]

I left one of my cotton dishcloth-potholders too close to the burner, and it did ignite very well.

[mwknitter]

Are you sure you're not thinking of dish cloths? Most people use 100% cotton for wash cloths. But wool is far superior to cotton as an insulating material & you do want pot holders to insulate your hand from the hot pot. I'd guess that non-superwash wool would be a bit better than the superwash kind. But, if choosing between superwash wool & cotton, the superwash would win hands down. Also, if I had superwash in the right colors & amounts & I liked the combination, I'd definitely use what I had on hand. So I say go for it with the 220 Superwash (which I like a lot anyway.)

[madknits]

I've made potholders with wool, which I then felted (which I know you won't be able to do with superwash, at least not easily). Wool is a good insulating material, and I think superior to cotton for pothoders.

Just don't use acrylic. It will melt.
Ick.

[thesuburbs]

Thanks for the advice everyone! (Hooray I can use the superwash from my stash!) I may have been thinking a bit about dishcloths usually being made out of cotton, but cotton was the recommended yarn for this pattern and it looked like 99% of the people on ravelry who had made this pattern used cotton, so I wanted to make sure. I appreciate all of your helpful advice!! :)

[mwknitter]

I noticed that & thought it a little weird. But it may have been what she had in her stash or she may be used to knitting dish cloths & towels & it just seemed a natural extension to use the same type of yarn for all kitchen items. And I think there are a lot of knitters who use only the yarn recommended by (or used by) the designer of the pattern. This is not limited to knitting either. I have a friend - we have been friends since college & years ago - when one was still expected to wear dresses or skirt suits for work (even pants suits were verboten for women)- I used to make all my clothes for work. She did some sewing but not as much as I did. Once, when we went shopping for fabric & patterns, she marveled that I was buying fabric that was different from what was shown in the photo on the pattern envelope. It turned out that, unless she could find the exact fabric that matched the envelope picture, she didn't have the confidence to buy fabric. She said that it was impossible for her to visualize a pattern in orhter fabric

[sarakate]

This is terribly common. A lot of people just can't visualize at all how something would work up in a different fabric, different yarn, different color, etc. There are jokes about people who really love a pattern, but they were wanting to make a blue sweater and this one is green.... but it actually happens; I have heard one of the workers at my LYS gently working a customer around to the notion that she could make a sweater out of the blue Cascade 220 instead of the green Cascade 220 the pattern called for. It's rather sad