Willow Bridge Fiber Mill
Willow Bridge Fiber Mill is the name of our alpaca fiber processing mill. We process aplaca fiber from fleece to finished product.
From skirted fleece to yarn on cones $26.00 per received pound. From Skirted fleece to rovings, clouds, batts $20.00 per received weight.
Imported alpaca products - garments, yarns, household items - have the reputation of having at minimum 12% wool combined with the alpaca fiber in the yarn from which the items are made. Whether from South America, China, or Australia, the international textile standard allows 12% "other" to be combined with the alpaca and still be labeled 100% alpaca.
Because we process the fiber from fleece to product, we can guarantee our 100% alpaca products ARE truly 100% alpaca. All wool has a barb. Alpaca fiber does not. Wool items have a "prickle factor". Truly 100% alpaca items can be worn by most next to skin without irritation.
At our mill each alpaca fiber fleece is individually hand sorted (any fiber that is not blanket fiber [course, second cuts, matted fiber], vegetative and other foreign matter is removed).
The fiber is washed, then again hand sorted as it is layed out onto drying racks designed and built by Roy Lord.
When dry, the fiber is separated/dehaired and looks like a cloud. This fiber is then hand weighed into equal ounce feed amounts and put into containers (again designed and built by Roy Lord). Each separate feed amount is run through the carder. The carder aligns the fibers and produces either batts for felted fabric or rovings for spinning.
The rovings are then combined, stretched, and recombined as many
times as necessary to produce and even, consistent roving for spinning.
The processes must be calculated for each fleece as each has its own different characteristics - fiber thickness, length, texture, softness, color - to be considered.
Each roving produces a single ply yarn. As each set of rovings is
unique, the settings must be hand calculated for the spinner for each
run.
The single ply yarn is combined into 2 to 16 ply yarn. Again, each run must be set up individually to produce the desired yarn.