Velvet, and Why Silk Velvet Is Worth the Fuss
Hold a crimson velvet next to a crimson satin in the same light. The satin will be brighter. The velvet will look lit from within.
That difference is the whole reason we keep buying velvet, and it comes down to something quite specific about how the cloth is built.
Velvet is a fabric with a pile
Most cloth is flat: threads crossing threads. Velvet has a pile — a dense forest of short fibre ends standing upright from the base, created by weaving two layers face to face and slicing them apart.
Those upright fibres are why velvet does what it does to colour. Light goes into the pile, bounces around between the fibres, and some of it never comes back out. What you see is colour with shadow inside it. Brush the pile one way and it looks darker; brush it the other and it lifts. This is called the nap, and it is why a velvet scrunchie appears to change shade as it moves on your wrist.
It is also why velvet is a nuisance to sew. Every piece has to be cut running the same direction, or you end up with a scrunchie that is two different colours.
Silk velvet, cotton velvet, and the crushed stuff
Not all velvet is the same, and the difference is worth knowing before you spend.
Silk velvet — or in our case a fine 70% silk velvet, which we found after perusing a great many velvet shops — has a short, dense, extraordinarily soft pile that catches light in a liquid sort of way. It drapes rather than stands. It is the most expensive velvet by some margin and the one we are quietest and proudest about.
Cotton and viscose velvets have a slightly stiffer pile and a matte richness rather than a shine. They gather beautifully and hold their shape well, which makes them excellent for an XL scrunchie where you want real volume. Several of our deepest jewel colours are these.
Crushed velvet has had its pile deliberately flattened in random directions. It is a look, and there is nothing wrong with it, but it is a different thing entirely and generally much cheaper.
If a velvet is described only as "velvet" with no fibre named, it is almost always polyester.
How velvet behaves in the hair
Velvet is soft on hair — the pile means what touches your hair is fibre ends rather than a hard woven surface, so there is very little to snag on.
It also grips slightly, which is genuinely useful. A satin scrunchie can slide down a fine ponytail over the course of a day. Velvet stays put. If you have fine or freshly washed hair that refuses to hold anything, velvet is the fabric we would point you at first.
The trade-off is that velvet is warm and has presence. It suits autumn, winter and evening. A velvet scrunchie in August is a choice.
Looking after velvet
The one rule: do not crush it, and do not iron it.
An iron will flatten the pile permanently and leave a shiny patch that cannot be undone. If a velvet scrunchie has been squashed in a bag, hold it over the steam from a kettle for a few seconds — not touching — and the pile will lift back up on its own. It is a genuinely satisfying thing to watch.
Wash by hand in cool water, squeeze gently, never wring. Reshape while damp and dry flat, away from direct heat. If the nap looks uneven when dry, stroke it back into one direction with your fingers.
Stored loose in a drawer rather than squashed under things, a velvet scrunchie will outlast almost anything else we make.
The velvets we currently have
The collection moves around, but there is usually a lilac silk velvet, a royal blue, a smoky grey, and a crimson — including a crimson with rhinestones for people who feel that velvet alone is insufficiently dramatic, and we rather agree.
Velvet is also the fabric we send out most often as a gift, which is why we offer six XL velvet scrunchies over six months for the price of five.
Regular and XL, both with our signature wide elastic.
→ Browse the velvet scrunchies
Next in the Fabric Library: Cotton — the one people underestimate.