How to Stop Pilling Happening to Your Favourite Sweaters

And keep your sweaters looking as good as new.

There’s nothing worse than finding a patch of messy looking pills on your favourite sweater. Pilling happens when fibres in a knit come loose, and as a result, make some of our favourite pieces feel tired. According to Micah Cameron, the women’s design director at Roots, “Pilling is often inevitable,” but there’s no need to ditch your knits at the first sign of fuzz. With some help from an expert like Cameron, you can easily restore a sweater to good-as-new condition in just four simple steps:

How to stop pilling:

l. Check the care label inside the garment to confirm washing instructions.

2. Wear a layer under your knits to help cut down the number of times the outer sweater needs to be washed.

3. Avoid picking, plucking or shaving pills with a razor.

4. Remove pills by laying the garment on a flat surface and running a raw pumice stone in circles over pilled areas to take take away unwanted nubs.