Look closely at the labels inside children’s clothes and you’ll find an increasingly varied list of fibres. Organic cotton, recycled polyester, viscose, lyocell — and, more and more often, names such as TENCEL™ and ECOVERO™.
We recently came across both in a sweater from Danish childrenswear brand Fliink, which made us curious about what those names actually mean.
Because TENCEL™ sounds like a fabric. It isn’t quite.
So, what exactly is TENCEL™?
TENCEL™ is a brand name belonging to Austrian fibre manufacturer Lenzing.
It starts with wood. The wood is turned into pulp, and the cellulose naturally found inside it is used to create very fine fibres that can be spun into yarn and eventually made into clothing.
What makes those fibres particularly interesting for children’s clothes is how they feel.
TENCEL™ fibres are known for their smoothness and their ability to manage moisture. In a finished garment, that can translate into something wonderfully soft against the skin, breathable and comfortable to wear.
And that matters in children’s clothing.
A sweater can be beautifully designed, but if it’s itchy, stiff or uncomfortable, it isn’t going to become the one they reach for. The best children’s clothes have to work with the child wearing them: soft enough for a long day and comfortable enough for everything that day might involve.
And what about ECOVERO™?
Our Fliink sweater contains another unfamiliar name: LENZING™ ECOVERO™.
Like TENCEL™, ECOVERO™ is made from wood. The wood is turned into pulp, and the cellulose inside it is then used to create soft fibres that can be spun into yarn and made into clothing.
The two aren’t exactly the same, but for the purposes of reading a clothing label, the important part is much simpler: both start with wood from certified or controlled sources, and both have been developed by Lenzing with a focus on reducing the environmental impact of fibre production.
ECOVERO™ is Lenzing’s alternative to conventional viscose, a soft, lightweight fibre already found in plenty of clothing. Its production is designed to use less water and generate lower carbon emissions than conventional viscose.
For a brand such as Fliink, fibres like these offer something particularly useful: a way to think more carefully about where materials come from without sacrificing the softness, movement and comfort that matter so much in children’s clothes.
So, does choosing TENCEL™ actually make a difference?
It can. But perhaps not for quite the reason we might assume.
We have become used to seeing the language of sustainability everywhere we shop. Recycled. Organic. Responsibly sourced. Lower impact. Fashion brands are making increasingly ambitious environmental promises, while the labels inside our clothes seem to contain more information than ever.
For parents, there is another consideration too. Children’s clothes spend hours against their skin. We want them to be soft and breathable, certainly, but we also want to feel comfortable with what they are made from and how those materials have been produced.
That doesn’t mean that a fibre made from wood is simply “natural” while a synthetic one is “full of chemicals.” Textile production is more complicated than that. TENCEL™ itself requires a manufacturing process to turn wood pulp into the wonderfully soft fibre we eventually wear.
What makes it interesting is how that process has been designed.
The wood used for TENCEL™ fibres comes from certified or controlled sources. In the production of TENCEL™ Lyocell, more than 99.8% of the solvent used to turn the wood pulp into fibre is recovered and returned to the production loop. LENZING™ ECOVERO™, meanwhile, is produced using at least 50% less water and generating at least 50% fewer carbon emissions than generic viscose.
So these aren’t simply nice-sounding names on a label. They represent some very specific choices about raw materials, resources and how a fibre is made.
There is one more distinction worth making. TENCEL™ and ECOVERO™ tell us about the fibres themselves: where their raw material comes from and how those fibres are produced. OEKO-TEX® STANDARD 100 looks at something different, testing textiles for a wide range of substances that may be harmful to human health.
For parents, that’s perhaps where all those labels begin to become genuinely useful. Not as badges we’re expected to recognise, but as different pieces of information about the clothes we’re choosing for our children.
We don’t need to know the chemistry behind every sweater we buy. But we can look for brands that are making thoughtful choices at more than one stage: where their fibres come from, how they’re produced, what else goes into the finished garment and, ultimately, how that garment feels and performs.
Why we love this one
And then, sometimes, all of that technical information becomes something wonderfully simple.
You touch the sweater.
The Fliink knit that sent us down this particular rabbit hole is extraordinarily soft. It has a silky feel, plenty of comfortable stretch and a lovely weight without feeling stiff or cumbersome.
That doesn’t happen simply because the label says TENCEL™. It is the result of the fibres, the blend, the knit and the way Fliink has put them together.
But it is exactly the sort of piece we want to find for Pip & Mim: beautiful enough to catch our eye, considered in the way it has been made, and so comfortable that a child might actually choose it from the drawer.
Because better materials matter. But what we really want are better clothes.
Shop the Fliink sweater here.