Natural colors have always been a fashion designer’s choice for classic good looks that last. Morehouse Merino Wool is available in five natural colors: soft white, oatmeal, silver, brown heather and chocolate brown. The colors are achieved by blending white wool with natural colored wool.

Processing the wool

At shearing time, the sheep are divided into 2 groups:   black wool and white wool. First we shear the white sheep and pack their wool into wool bags. Then the black ones are shorn and their wool is packed into separate bags. During the scouring process—washing and cleaning of the wool—white and black wool is treated separately.

Blending the wool

The blending takes place at the spinning mill on the carding machine. A pre-determined amount (depending on how light or dark the natural color will be) of black wool is added to the white wool. The carding machine acts like a comb through your hair — it untangles and straightens the wool fibers, then divides the fluffy layer of wool into long thin strips (called pencil roving). During the spinning process, the pencil roving is twisted lightly, then plied together to make the final yarn.   > About Morehouse Merino Wool

Sunshine turns black to chocolate

The natural colors vary from year to year, depending on the amount of sunshine or rain we have during the year’s wool growth. Sunshine bleaches the tips of the black wool to a rich dark chocolate brown (that’s why the black Merino sheep appear to be brown, rather than black). The more sunshine we have during the year, the browner the black wool will be. And very hot and humid summers turn white wool to a creamy yellow. The wool on the Merino ram on the left may appear to be grey, it’s actually white. Dirt clings to the tips of the wool and give it it’s grey appearance.

Morehouse Merino natural colors are 100% natural

100% White Merino Yarn			100% Chocolate Brown Merino Yarn

92% White blended with
8% Chocolate Brown
will produce Oatmeal

85% White blended with
15% Chocolate Brown
will produce Silver

65% White blended with
35% Chocolate Brown
will produce Brown Heather