Please click for the page listing all WeatherWool Fabric Batches. 

All of Batch 5 has been made into garments. The Factory8 tailors completed all Batch 5 work in 2021 and all or nearly all the garments have been sold.

Batch 5 is the first Batch of our Fabric to have Fabric Number Batch Tags sewn  into each of the garments made from this Fabric.

COVID-19 has made things really crazy with Batch 5.

For technical reasons, some of the Batch 5 garments will bear a 56 tag.

The "greasy" wool (wool as it is sheared from the sheep) for our weft fiber was purchased, as usual, with the aid and guidance of Advisors and Ranchers Bob Padula and Mike Corn

The greasy was purchased in April, 2018 and October, 2018 (the Padula clip):

• M&J Corn Ranch:  5573 pounds / 2527 kg (57%)
• McMurry (Genopalette®) Ranch:  3199 pounds /1451 kg (32%)
• PM (Bob Padula) Ranch:  1063 pounds / 482 kg (11%)

It was an absolutely crazy-long time for us to still be working in 2021 on greasy purchased in 2018 ... and we do have a separate page on the Production Backstory ...

Batch 5 greasy was scoured (cleaned) at Bollman Industries in Texas. Batch 5 weighed 9835 pounds (4460 kg) "dirty" and weighed 5757 pounds (2611 kg) after scouring, for a yield of 58%. This means that 42% of the weight of the fleece was wool grease (lanolin), dirt, twigs, vegetable matter and other debris. This is actually a very high yield.

Batch 5 includes FullWeight Fabrics (Drab, Duff and Lynx Pattern) and MidWeight Drab Fabric. Batch 5 will not include MidWeight Lynx Fabric, and will eventually include FullWeight Black.

From Bollman Industries, Batch 5 was shipped to American Woolen Company in Connecticut in May of 2019. In January of 2019, Debby and I visited AWC and were very favorably impressed with the people and with their experience. Structurally, AWC is a very old company, and for many years had been operated by Loro Piana, the 200-year old Italian family company renowned for luxury textiles. We loved the idea that Loro Piana's luxury could be matched with our hardcore performance. And indeed, AWC, working with Pennsylvania's great Material Technology and Logistics (MTL) for the weaving, produced a small amount of marvelous Fabric in November 2019. AWC also made us very happy by bringing in Rob Stuart, who has been our Fabric Engineer since before we had fabric.

In November of 2019, we sent to AWC a purchase order requesting they turn the rest of the Batch 5 fiber into finished Fabric.

AWC was working on our PO when the virus pretty well shut things down, and  things were at a standstill until about April of 2021. Things are becoming more and more normal ... here's hoping!

Please click for the page listing all WeatherWool Fabric Batches. 

30 March 2022 --- Ralph