How to Identify Real Silk Carpets?

Shopping for your home interiors and looking for the true silk carpets and rugs? Although purchasing these seems very easy but in reality this is not the case as you will have to be very careful while buying these.

Cocoon of silkworm is the source of true silk that is spun by the silk moth caterpillar. Silk is then harvested by boiling the cocoon along with silkworm. After boiling, the cocoon is freed from worm and unwound into single fiber. Whereas artificial silk is either made from mercerized cotton or rayon.

Pure Silk carpets are very tightly woven with at least 200 knots per sq. inches and occasionally 500 or more knots. On the other hand artificial silk carpets has mostly less than 250 knots per sq inch. You can also check the fringe and feel the difference between these two.

Tests to Identify the Pure Silk Carpet

By Rubbing Silk
Although this is a very basic test yet you can identify the true silk and its quality by rubbing part of it on your palm. The genuine silk will feel warm but the artificial silk will stay cool even after rubbing.

Burning Test
It is another very helpful test differentiating true and artificial silk. To do this test take a very small fringe or a knot from the back of the carpet. Burn this and check out its smell and ash. If the ash is soft and chalky and its smell is like that of burning paper then the rug is made from artificial silk but on the other hand if the burning smell is that of like burning hair and on burning the knot curls into small black ball type form then it is real silk carpet. As silk is a protein so it burns like protein.

By Dissolving It
It is one of the most accurate test that is performed to check real vs fake silk carpets. Make the solution of 16 g copper sulfate (CuSO4) in 150 cc of water at room temperature. After this add 8-10 g glycerine and then caustic soda (sodium hydroxide: NaOH) into this to get the clear solution. If you will put very small piece of pure silk in it then it will get dissolved in it but on the other hand artificial fabric will remain as such.

With these test you can identify the two fabric. Check out this to know more on carpet fiber identification.