Do I like Wool Pressing Mats?

Welcome to SewVeryEasy, my name is Laura. And I'm often asked, do I like wool pressing mats? Well, let's find the answer out. I have been sewing pretty much all my life, and I have been using wool to press with just as long. In garment construction, we use these hands a lot. It helps shape sleeves. They're made out of wool. You can get long little tubes that are also designed for pressing in garment making. They're also made with wool. If you needed a different shape, we would often take a piece of wool and roll it really tight to give us this round pressing shape. And we used it as a pressing bar. So in the sewing industry, for years I have been using wool. In the sewing community, we now can get wool pressing mats. We can get them all different sizes. You can also get them different thicknesses. Wool pressing mats retain heat and they help prevent fabric from moving. When I put down a quilt block, smooth it out with my hand, when I go to press it, even if I'm ironing it, there's a less chance of this block moving. The heat of the iron can stretch fabric because it relaxes the fibers. So with that heat and that ironing, we can actually press and distort our shapes. So you'll notice sometimes if you're pressing or ironing really hard, we've taken this and we have changed that straight line and we've curved it. That's because of the heat of the iron and the force that we have used. The wool pressing mat helps prevent that. Because it holds onto that fabric, we're less likely to stretch it. And because the wool does retain the heat, it helps press from both sides. So even though I will be pressing from the top, the heat does penetrate into the wool, so I'm giving a little bit of a press from the other side. I do like the pressing mat to be the half inch mat. I do want something that has some weight to it. Wool pressing mats, of course, are made out of wool. So wool does contain lanolin and that lanolin is very gentle on our fabric and it's very gentle on our hands. I spend a lot of time ironing and having this beautiful surface is really nice on my hands. Having this also a half inch thick means we're able to pin on it. And there are times that we do need to pin things to block them. Blocking is more common in knitting and crocheting because after that garment has been done, we pin it, steam it, and block it. So the wool mats work well even for the knitting and the crocheting. The one disadvantage of a wool mat is sometimes the smell. Because this is a raw wool, it still has the lanolin in it and you often will find little flecks in it. That raw wool is really what makes the mat so nice but it sometimes will have a bit of a smell to it. Over time that smell does go away but if you find it's a very strong smell you can spray it with a little bit of a Febreze or you can put a little bit of water and fabric softener in a spray bottle and spray that surface. The fabric softener is okay on the wool and it will just help that wool smell nice. You can also wash these. Now it's not something you're going to throw in the wash machine but you can take a wet cloth and wash them. So if you do not like the smell you can wash them. Just get a soap that you would use to wash delicates. Bowl of water with some soap and just wash that mat down on both sides and let it dry. And knowing that we can wash these means that over time if you use a lot of starch you can wash these and wash that starch off. I have two wool pressing mats. The smaller one is a great one to bring beside your machine. It will often fit on top of a TV tray so we can bring this to the couch if we need to pin things on or we want to do a little bit of pressing beside the sewing machine. They also fit on these great folding wooden tables. So I often have this sitting beside my sewing machine and I can put this mat right on top. This large mat is 24 inches by 48 inches. The smaller mat is 12 by 18 inches and they are both half inch thicknesses. And the mats that I do have are from Mountain Mist and this is the same company that makes the quilt batting. The other question I get concerning these wool mats will the heat ruin the surface that the mat is sitting on? The mat itself can hold a lot of heat and a lot of moisture before it can disturb that surface. Do not put these wool mats over top of your cutting mats and iron. It will warp them. I would also not put them on top of a fine wood furniture. The moisture and the heat can warp and ruin furniture. However, on these melamine surfaces it really does hold up well. I do a lot of pressing and I do end up with a very very hot surface. So underneath my mat I use it as storage. I have the labels that I'm going to put on a quilt underneath and I also keep my Teflon pressing sheets underneath. This really helps protect my surface and it's a way of storing my sheets. These are thin enough it's not going to distract from the mat though I have used these melamine surfaces on their own for a lot of pressing and it did not bother them. I just wouldn't want to take a chance and use a good wood and definitely not a cutting mat. I have used this wood tray with this cutting mat for six months and I've had no distortion at all and I just wouldn't want to take a chance if it was my good dining room set. So I hope those tips have helped you out. So to answer that question yes, I love wool pressing mats. The big ones and the small ones. I love that I can bring these close to my machine pin on them transport them wherever I want and the large one I love being able to press a big surface and having it stay exactly the way I want it. Thank you for joining me today on SewVeryEasy. Feel free to subscribe and come on back. Let's see what we're talking about next time in the sewing room. Bye for now.