MSU Fashion: 2013 Cotton for a New Age- Part II

A Visit to Cotton Incorporated and TC²

Apparel, Textiles, and Merchandising (ATM) Students at Mississippi State University were given the opportunity to visit Cotton Incorporated’s world headquarters in Cary, NC in November of 2013 as part of their cotton grant. While they were in North Carolina, the students also visited TC², Textile Clothing Technology Corporation.

ATM students and faculty were given multiple presentations and a walking tour at Cotton Incorporated. There was also a presentation about Cotton University, which is a free service offered to students, that has numerous resources such as textile journals and articles, virtual career fairs, open access to all registered people, and much more. Students came face-to-face with industry professionals to learn all about how Cotton is being innovative in their research and development, printing and dyeing services, marketing techniques, and everything in-between. Students were honored by this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

We were greeted with free Cotton University merchandise before the presentations and tour.

The cotton that had already been spun.

We got to see lots of complex machinery that spun fibers and weaved them together.

These are some of the samples that Cotton Inc. offers their customers. Cotton Inc. basically sells the "ingredients/directions" in order to make a certain print, color, finish, etc. They sell ideas to companies on how to be more efficient and innovative in their production processes.

Cotton Inc. can print designs directly onto their clothing just like printing on paper. It was very interesting!

These are some of the machines that are used to dye the fabric and finish it.

Have you heard of a "stone wash" jean? They actually place lots of these stones (pictured left) in their industrial-sized washing machines with their fabric to give it the worn out look. On the right is a fabric printed flower along with the stone-washed effect.

This is another shot of the spinning lab.

This is a machine that actually tests the quality of the cotton.

She actually turned the loom on and gave us a live demonstration of how fast the cotton is spun. That's a lot of strings to get tangled!

This was one of the main presentations we were given that explained a lot about the company and what services Cotton Inc. offers. They also had some garments they recently manufactured.

This was another short presentation during the walk through tour that showed some of their samples.

This is our whole group of ATM students. We had a great time and learned a lot! Our biggest thanks goes to Cotton Incorporated for having us.

Students jumped for joy at this wonderful experience.

Our Experience at TC²

The main thing that TC²does is body scanning and making custom clothes for their customers. We got to see a full body scanning demonstration on one of our students.