Jute is a very interesting colorful material with great potential. Jute things can be delicate, rude, romantic, and trivial. Jute is easily combined with many styles of clothing, harmoniously fits into almost any interior. No wonder so many people love this stuff. I myself have long been happy to wear such bags, use baskets, pillows, stands for hot and apply it wherever my imagination wanted.

But when I post a new work, in the column "recommendations for care" I sparingly write "dry cleaning". Every time there is a feeling that this is not enough, that the buyer will be disappointed with such recommendations and will not receive an exhaustive answer to all their questions. I thought how to fix it and decided to write an article that will describe in detail how jute things behave, what can be done with them, and what cannot.

My first bag was fully kneated of jute, including a strap. I wore it every day in winter and summer, loaded mercilessly with heavy and volume things. It got torn after a while. The strap tore. It turned out that jute was very durable, but it did not like frequent twists and rubbing. So, I understood that handbags should have eyelets, rings and handles of other, more resilient materials. Jute passing through a smooth ring, almost not frayed. In other places, despite the constant weight, the bag was not torn. One bag was torn on the side, where it constantly touched the sharp sticking rivet on my jacket. There's nothing you can do, no need to blink the bag on sharp objects.

With pleasure I noted that even in the strongest rain things in a bag remained dry, and it remained dry for a long time. These unique hygroscopic features of jute have been known for a long time, and earlier salt, sugar and everything that could not be soaked were transported in jute bags.

My hiking bag often helped me out when I had to sit on cold stones. I sat down right on it and it was absolutely warm and dry. It is clear that not all girls want this experience, but it may be useful for someone.

One of jute disadvantages is its weight. A bag of medium size weighs about a kilogram. This is more than the weight of an ordinary empty bag. I had to stop using big bags. Another drawback of new jute things — its hair. Small villi first crumble and are clearly visible on black, but this period passes quickly and then nothing can be seen.

I never had to wash any of my bags all the time. Even when travelling through forests and mountains, nothing particularly stuck in them. It was enough to shake out a dry bag or clean where dirt stuck. There were no spots. If the bag is not in extreme conditions, even this is not necessary. The bag always looks clean and tidy. Another jute feature is that it eventually darkens and turns yellow. But I noticed it only in comparison with new jute. Neither the appearance of the thing nor its features were not affected.

As for baskets, pillows and other interior things, none of them broke and did not require washing. A disadvantage of pillows is that you cannot lie on them with face or naked body. It has rough texture and will prick, but it does not cause allergies because of their natural origin. New things of jute may have odor, which is felt, especially when sniffing. Weathered quickly, usually at the stage of making things. Very good jute coasters under hot, they do not conduct heat and moisture.

And finally, I decided to conduct a small experiment and see what would happen to jute if to wash it. For this, I made a few small samples with a décor of jute and white cotton. The samples were washed in slightly warm water with hands and in a washing machine at temperature of 60 degrees. That's what happened.

Before washing

After washing

After hand washing jute did not change (right). After the washing machine, jute darkened, turned pink and shrinked. The cotton heart wasn`t so white either. The jute dries for a long time up to several days, depending on the room temperature and spin. After drying, it becomes a little tougher, but after kneading it again becomes the same.