Nonwoven fabrics for hygiene and personal care, manufactured to order

Hygiene and personal care products are judged on the first second of contact. The substrate has to feel soft against sensitive skin, carry and release a lotion or a cleanser evenly, and stay intact while it is being used. Spunlace is the construction that delivers all three, and it is the material we produce for converters serving this market.

The process is what gives the fabric its character. A carded web is built from selected fibres and then bonded by rows of high-pressure water jets that drive fibres through the web and entangle them around one another. Nothing is added: no binder, no adhesive, no thermal calendering that would flatten the surface. The web is bonded by its own structure, so it gains strength and durability without losing the soft, cloth-like hand of the fibre it was made from. That is why spunlace behaves so differently from a thermally bonded fabric of the same weight on skin.

Fibre selection sets everything downstream. Viscose gives absorbency and a natural hand and is the backbone of most personal care blends. Tencel adds a smooth, cool surface. Cotton brings a familiar feel and a clean label. Polyester adds wet strength and dimensional stability where a pad or wipe is stressed in use. Polypropylene adds chemical resistance and lowers cost, and PLA offers a bio-based route. Most commercial substrates are a blend, and we manufacture to the ratio a converter specifies rather than offering a fixed recipe.

The end uses follow from the fabric. Feminine care products use the softness and the controlled absorbency directly. Moisture management layers move fluid away from the skin and hold it. Grooming, cleansing and depilation products need a substrate that carries a formulation without disintegrating and that will not abrade skin in use. Facial cleansing pads and cosmetic pads need a lint-free surface and enough wet strength to be used with pressure. Personal hygiene wipes need all of it at once. The same substrate family is also moving into technical and durable applications as converters find that a fabric built for skin contact solves problems elsewhere.

Two specialised constructions round out the category. Substrates for stretch ears and for advanced fastening systems need elongation and recovery as well as softness, since they are stretched every time the product is closed and have to hold after repeated cycles. Biodegradable grades are built on viscose, Tencel and bamboo for converters whose customers are asking for an end-of-life story, and those fibres deliver it without giving up the absorbency and hand the product is bought for.

We manufacture hygiene and personal care substrates to order. Send the fibre blend, basis weight, width, laying method, any surface pattern or treatment and the product it is going into, and we will quote the specification delivered to your converting plant. The minimum order is one 40-foot container.