Bloom Mittens and Booties Set

Details

Two pairs of mittens and two pairs of booties in cotton rib. Newborn nails are sharp and newborn hands go straight to the face, which is the whole reason mittens exist. A mitten spends more time in a mouth than anything else a newborn wears, so the test that matters here is colourfastness to saliva. It has a real method, DIN 53160-1, and this dye grades 5 on it, which is no transfer at all. Formaldehyde is below 16 mg per kg by ISO 14184-1, the level set for articles for babies under three, against the 75 mg per kg allowed on adult skin-contact clothing. Restricted aromatic amines from azo colourants are below 20 mg per kg. There is a deliberate decision in the cuff, and it runs the opposite way to the one we make on a T-shirt collar. A T-shirt rib gets 5 percent elastane because a rib with no elastane goes wavy, and we print that rather than round the garment to 100 percent cotton. Here we did the reverse: no elastane, no threaded elastic, nothing but the knit structure holding the cuff. The cost is real and we will state it. After roughly forty washes the rib relaxes and the booties start slipping off. An elastane cuff would hold longer and would sit a synthetic against a newborn's wrist for twelve hours a day, and a threaded elastic would leave a mark. We chose the one that loosens. The seams are turned to the outside, which is not a style decision. A newborn lies still for most of the day and cannot move away from a ridge, so a seam across the knuckles or the toes is a mark that is still there at the next change.

• 100 percent cotton, 1x1 rib, 220 GSM, fibre confirmed by ISO 1833 and weight to ISO 3801
• No elastane and no threaded elastic anywhere. The rib holds by knit structure alone, and it will relax after about forty washes
• Seams turned outward at the toe and across the knuckles, so nothing presses on a baby who cannot move away from it
• Saliva fastness DIN 53160-1 grade 5, perspiration ISO 105-E04 grade 4 to 5, washing ISO 105-C06 grade 4 to 5
• Formaldehyde below 16 mg per kg by ISO 14184-1, the infant level. Adult skin-contact wear is allowed 75
• Azo amines below 20 mg per kg by EN 14362-1, and no optical brighteners under UV
• No cords, no ties and no drawstrings, which EN 14682 forbids in the head and neck area for children under seven and which have no business at a wrist either
• No buttons, no appliques and no decoration of any kind. Anything that can come off a newborn's mitten is a choking hazard first and a decoration second
• Sewing thread is polyester, about 2 percent of the set by weight. Cotton thread breaks in a stretch seam and a burst seam on a mitten is worse than a thread that is not cotton
• Undyed cream and a sand shade from a low-impact reactive dye. The palette is pale because pale is what holds a grade 5 saliva fastness, and that is the honest reason rather than a styling one
• Residual shrinkage under 3 percent after three washes at 40 C, ISO 6330 measured to ISO 5077
• Buy by height and weight, not by the month on the label. Machine wash at 40 C in a mesh bag or you will lose one, and you will lose one anyway