How to store sheets for the long term

We get asked often how best to store your pure linens for long periods of time, so if you like to change your bedrooms colour palate seasonally, this short guide we developed may help.

Pure linen fabric is one of the oldest known textiles, having been used to make everything from fine lace detail to the largest of seaworthy sails.

Linen’s unique cellular structure is extremely strong and surprisingly heavy; and at the same time, it is also cooler against the skin than almost any other natural fibre. This is because moisture passes so easily through its hollow fibres, allowing for even greater absorbency than cotton and outstanding thermo dynamic properties. This trait also makes long term storage most important.

• Always clean linens before you store them, because stains oxidise over time.
• Make sure storage area is dry, insect free and dark.
• When storing any bed linens, the most important thing to keep in mind is that anything made of wood pulp, i.e., tissue paper, newsprint, or cardboard, may react with the linen over extended periods of time. Coloured tissue paper may over time also bleed into the linen.
• Make sure that if you are using plastic containers, that they are made from Polyethylene, which is stable, or inert. Other types of plastics release gases as it breaks down, so it's bad for storing linens over the long term.
• Dry-cleaning bags, for instance, react with linen, becoming sticky over time.
• Acid-free boxes and tubes are available if you intend to store the items for a number of years or decades.