What Is Bamboo Fabric?

The fabric behind every Doux Rêves piece, from stalk to softness

I was a total stranger to bamboo fabric. The first time I was exposed to it, felt how buttery soft it was, I was surprised. Bamboo, to me, meant something tall and fibrous, almost woody. How did that become this?

Bamboo doesn't go from a stalk to a soft fabric on its own. The bamboo is broken down into pulp, dissolved into a cellulose solution, then pushed through fine spinnerets and re-formed into a continuous fiber, the same viscose process used to turn wood pulp into rayon. What changes is the starting plant, not the process.

That's why, on our care labels and everywhere else that regulators require accuracy, we call it viscose rather than "bamboo." It's the correct name, and it's also the legally required one in most of the markets we sell into.

When I got told the composition had to state viscose and not bamboo I wondered: what about cotton? A composition tag can say "100% cotton," and cotton is transformed too: picked, ginned, spun, woven. To me, both fibers go through a transformation before they become fabric. Why does one get to keep its plant name and the other doesn't?

It comes down to whether the plant is structurally changed or not. Fresh berries, picked and rinsed, are still just berries: nothing about their structure changed, so the label can legally say "100% Berries." Turn those same berries into jam (crushed, boiled down, completely transformed) and the label can't say "fruit" anymore. It has to say "jam." Cotton is the fresh berries: cleaned and spun, but never structurally changed from the fiber the plant grew. Bamboo viscose is the jam: melted down and completely remade into a new, soft fiber. That's the same logic regulators apply to our fabric: cotton stays cotton because nothing about its structure changed; bamboo becomes viscose because it did.

How does it compare to cotton?

Every fiber holds a certain amount of moisture at rest, and that number is a good stand-in for how a fabric feels against skin. Under standard test conditions (65% relative humidity, 21°C), cotton holds about 8.5% of its weight in moisture; bamboo viscose holds closer to 11%.

Source: Gericke & van der Pol, "Comfort Properties of Viscose Fibres," 2010.

That higher regain is part of why bamboo viscose feels cooler and drier against skin. It pulls moisture away from the body more readily.

What is OEKO-TEX Class I certification?

Every Doux Rêves fabric is certified to OEKO-TEX Standard 100, Class I, the strictest of the four certification tiers, reserved for products intended for babies and children up to three years old. It means the finished fabric has been independently tested for a long list of substances (including formaldehyde, heavy metals, pesticide residues, and allergenic dyes) and found to fall under limits far tighter than what's required for adult clothing. This certification applies to the finished fabric.

Why did we choose it?

We chose bamboo viscose for how it feels against a newborn's skin: soft from the first wash, breathable, and gentle on the kind of skin that reacts to almost everything. Class I certification is non-negotiable for Doux Rêves. All covers, inserts and sleepwear are certified. This is a commitment from the brand to our customers to give only the best and safest for our little ones.

Sources: Gericke & van der Pol, "Comfort Properties of Viscose Fibres" (2010); OEKO-TEX Standard 100 certification documentation.