Fabric Guide: What Is Modal Fabric? Understanding How Modal Is Made and Whether Modal Is an Environmentally Conscious Choice

Some call it the underwear fabric and some just look to it as an environmentally-friendly textile option. Either way, modal is revolutionizing the fashion industry with its lightweight, stretchy, and breathable nature that takes beech tree pulp and turns it into an eco-conscious, durable option for clothing and housewares.

What Is Modal Fabric?

Modal fabric is a semi-synthetic fabric made from beech tree pulp that is used primarily for clothing, such as underwear and pajamas, and household items, like bed sheets and towels. Modal is a form of rayon, another plant-based textile, though it is slightly more durable and flexible than the standard version. Modal is often blended with other fibers like cotton and spandex for added strength. Modal is considered a luxurious textile thanks to both its soft feel and high cost, as it is more expensive than either cotton or viscose.

Modal was originally developed in Japan in the 1950s. Today, most modal is produced by the Austrian company Lenzing AG, which has the trademark for the fabric; its brands include Lenzing Modal, China Modal, and Formatex. There are even lighter versions of the material dubbed MicroModal and Modal Air by Lenzing. These versions are even finer knit than standard modal and make the end product softer, therefore items made from these fabrics are considered even more luxurious.

How Is Modal Fabric Manufactured?

Modal fabric is a bio-based fabric that is made from spinning reconstituted beech tree cellulose. Modal is generally considered a more eco-friendly alternative to cotton because beech trees don’t require much water to grow and therefore the production process uses about 10-20 times less water.

Even though the material is plant-derived, the production process includes soaking the fabric in chemicals like sodium hydroxide and carbon disulfate, which in turn classify modal as semi-synthetic. Modal is a type of rayon fabric, but it is generally more durable than regular rayon and feels softer, like cotton.

Production Guide: What Is the Production Process for Modal?

1. Beech trees are harvested, chipped, and cellulose is extracted from the pulp.
2. Next, the cellulose is made into sheets, which are soaked in sodium hydroxide.
3. Those sheets are broken into smaller pieces, which are soaked in carbon disulfate. This produces sodium cellulose xanthate.
4. Cellulose xanthate is soaked in sodium hydroxide again. The subsequent liquid solution is put through a spinneret, which is a device with a series of holes that help create fibers.
5. The created fibers are soaked in sulfuric acid to form yarn. Once washed, bleached, and dried, the yarn is loaded onto spools.
6. From there, the yarn can be woven or knit into a fabric to form modal.

12 Benefits to Using and Wearing Modal Fabric

Modal is considered a luxury textile and is often used to blend with other fabrics to give a high-end feel with its lightness and softness. It has become very popular among eco-conscious fashion designers.

1. Stretchy. Modal’s flexibility makes it ideal for items like t-shirts and athletic wear.
2. Soft. Modal l has an incredible soft touch, and is often used for bed sheets, pajamas and undergarments.
3. Breathable. Modal is great for sports clothing and everyday clothes because the fabric’s weave is very breathable.
4. Water absorbent. Modal is 50% more absorbent than cotton; micropores inside the fabric absorb any water or sweat they come into contact with.
5. Durable. Modal is very strong because of the tight weave and the long fibers and is therefore used for garments and housewares that receive regular use.
6. Drapes well. Similar to rayon and other silk alternatives, modal has a beautiful drape that makes it ideal for clothing and decoration.
7. Eco-friendly. Modal is made from regenerative plants and there are fewer chemicals used in the production process than with other types of rayon.
8. Doesn’t pill. The fabric resists pilling and has a smooth finish that makes it ideal for everyday wear and use.
9. Color fast. The fabric absorbs dye in warm water and does not bleed dye during the laundering process.
10. Doesn’t shrink. Unlike most forms of rayon, modal is much less likely to shrink in the wash.
11. Biodegradable. Modal is completely biodegradable.

12.  Doesn’t crease. Modal resists wrinkles and will stay smooth with minimal ironing.

Modal Care Guide: How Do You Care for Modal Clothes?

Modal can be washed in the washing machine and tumble dried. However, be sure to check the item’s washing instructions, as a modal blend (with textiles like cotton and spandex) might have different requirements.

• Wash in cold water. Pure modal can be washed in any water temperature, though cold water is ideal. Dry cleaning is not necessary, unlike most rayons.
• Use oxygen-based bleach. Chlorine bleach can weaken the fabric, so it should be avoided in the washing process.
• Dry on low to medium heat. Make sure you take your items out of the dryer right away—or even when a little bit damp—to avoid wrinkling. Hang up immediately.

Rayon

Rayon is a manufactured fiber made from natural sources such as wood and agricultural products that are regenerated as cellulose fiber. The many types and grades of rayon can imitate the feel and texture of natural fibers such as silk, wool, cotton, and linen.

Rayon is manufactured from natural cellulose, and hence is not considered to be synthetic.[1] Technically, the term synthetic fiber is reserved for fully synthetic fibers. In manufacturing terms, rayon is classified as "a fiber formed by regenerating natural materials into a usable form".[2] Specific types of rayon include viscose, modal and lyocell, each of which differs in the manufacturing process and the properties of the finished product.

Rayon is made from purified cellulose, harvested primarily from wood pulp, which is chemically converted into a soluble compound. It is then dissolved and forced through a spinneret to produce filaments which are chemically solidified, resulting in fibers of nearly pure cellulose.[3] Unless the chemicals are handled carefully, workers can be seriously harmed by the carbon disulfide used to manufacture most rayon.[4][5] To safeguard the workers from the hazards of the chemicals, new technologies are now applied by the leading manufacturers of viscose to efficiently capture the emissions and recover and recycle the carbon disulfide.[citation needed] These technologies have significantly reduced the risks and have addressed the safety concern related to exposure workers to chemicals.

Nitrocellulose, a chemical derivative of cellulose produced with nitric acid, was first discovered in 1832 by Henri Braconnot but was unstably explosive until the 1846 process of Christian Schönbein. The degree of nitrification determined its explosiveness, solubility in organic solvents such as ether and acetone, and mechanical properties when dry. Its solubility was the basis for the first "artificial silk" by Georges Audemars in 1855, which he called "Rayon".[citation needed]

However, Hilaire de Chardonnet was the first to patent a nitrocellulose fiber marketed as "artificial silk" at the Paris Exhibition of 1889. Commercial production started in 1891, but the result was flammable and more expensive than cellulose acetate or cuprammonium rayon. Because of this, production ceased early in the 1900s. Nitrocellulose was briefly known as "mother-in-law silk".[6]

Frank Hastings Griffin invented the double-godet, a special stretch-spinning process that changed artificial silk to rayon, rendering it usable in many industrial products such as tire cords and clothing. Nathan Rosenstein invented the "spunize process" by which he turned rayon from a hard fiber to a fabric. This allowed rayon to become a popular raw material in textiles.

Acetate[edit]

In 1865, Paul Schützenberger discovered that cellulose reacts with acetic anhydride to form cellulose acetate. The German chemists Arthur Eichengrün and Theodore Becker invented the first soluble forms of cellulose acetate in 1903.[7]

By 1910, Camille Dreyfus and his brother Henri were producing acetate film for the motion picture industry. In 1913, after some twenty thousand separate experiments, they produced excellent laboratory samples of continuous filament yarn, something that had eluded others in the cellulose acetate industry.[8]

After World War I, attention turned to the production of acetate fibers. The first yarn was of fair quality, but sales resistance was heavy, and silk associates worked zealously to discredit acetate and discourage its use. However, the thermoplastic nature of acetate made it an excellent fiber for moiré because the pattern was permanent and did not wash away. The same characteristic also made permanent pleating a commercial fact for the first time, and gave great style impetus to the whole dress industry.[8]

Today, acetate is blended with silk, cotton, wool, nylon, etc. to give fabrics excellent wrinkle recovery, good heft, handle, draping quality, quick drying, proper dimensional stability, cross-dye pattern potential, at a very competitive price.[8]

Acetate shares many similarities with viscose rayon, and was formerly considered as the same textile. However, rayon resists heat while acetate is prone to melting. Acetate must be laundered with care either by hand-washing or dry cleaning, and acetate garments disintegrate when heated in a tumble dryer.[9][10] The two fabrics are now required to be listed distinctly on garment labels.[11]

Furthermore, viscose rayon production requires carbon disulfide in production, while acetate uses safer solvents such as acetone. However, because viscose rayon is a stronger and more robust fiber than the otherwise similar acetate, it has come to dominate the market.

Cellulose triacetate is a similar cellulose derivative to acetate. Acetate fiber is a modified or secondary acetate having two or more hydroxyl groups; triacetate is a primary acetate containing no hydroxyl group. Triacetate fibers contain a higher ratio of acetate-to-cellulose than do acetate fibers.

Triacetate is significantly more heat resistant than cellulose acetate; articles containing triacetate fibres require little special care, and are ironable up to 200 °C.