Design & R&D
3designers
We develop new qualities by combining the customer’s requests with our own accents.
Three specialist graphic analysts and designers work at the design desk. We do not sell a ready-made pattern catalogue; each job begins with the specification and request the customer gives us. Once colour, repeat, width, weight and knit structure are set, the pattern is built around them.
The work is bespoke: we take the incoming brief into graphic analysis and draw an original pattern that belongs to the customer. The same file becomes a shared reference for knitting and the dyehouse; the repeat we approve in design stays the same on the machine and through finishing.
Keeping the team to three is deliberate; the desk that takes the brief, builds the pattern and follows the sample is the same one. So nothing is lost moving from design to sample, and the pattern the customer asked for carries through to production exactly.
| Team | Three graphic analysts and designers |
|---|---|
| Output | Original, customer-specific pattern |
| Input | Customer specification and request |
| Scope | Design & R&D |
Related guides: Fibre Cross-Section Engineering: Trilobal, Hollow, Multi-Channel · Cationic-Dyeable Polyester (CDP/ECDP) · Bright, Semi-Dull, Full-Dull: Lustre Is Decided in the Polymer Plant
Questions about this unit
What changes when the fibre cross-section changes at the same denier?
Lustre, drying rate and thermal behaviour are redesigned. In a trilobal section light bounces from lobe to lobe — giving a silk-like gloss and soil hiding; how pronounced the lobe is is measured by the modification ratio, and an over-sharp lobe produces unwanted glitter. A multi-grooved section opens artificial capillaries along the fibre (Young–Laplace: a narrower channel draws harder). In a hollow section the void reaches roughly 5–25% of the cross-sectional area; still air raises insulation while lowering mass.
From the guide: Fibre Cross-Section Engineering: Trilobal, Hollow, Multi-Channel
How is the moisture performance of a cross-section verified?
Vertical wicking is measured to AATCC 197 — its 2022 revision defines the method as the vertical wicking rate to set distances: the lower end of a strip is touched to water and the time to climb to defined heights is recorded. The inward, outward and lateral distribution of the liquid is then resolved by AATCC 195 (MMT). A cross-section claim becomes objective through these two measurements, not through a catalogue description.
From the guide: Fibre Cross-Section Engineering: Trilobal, Hollow, Multi-Channel
How does cationic-dyeable polyester work?
By attaching a comonomer to the polymer chain. The sodium salt of 5-sulfoisophthalic acid dimethyl ester (SIPM) is built into the main chain during polycondensation, and its negatively charged sulfonate (—SO₃⁻) groups form FIXED ANIONIC SITES inside the fibre. In the dyebath the positively charged chromophore of the cationic dye displaces the Na⁺ ion and forms a strong ionic bond with that site — an anchoring mechanism ordinary PET simply does not have.
What separates CDP from ECDP, and what does it cost?
SIPM on its own lowers the polymer’s regularity and crystallinity and pulls Tg down by roughly 10 °C, yet CDP still needs pressure dyeing at about 120–130 °C. ECDP adds a fourth comonomer so that dyeing becomes possible at atmospheric boil, around 95–100 °C. The cost: disrupting chain regularity is not free — crystallinity falls measurably, melting point and molecular weight recede, fibre tenacity drops and light fastness is usually compromised.