Hemp
All About Hemp
My hemp rope is made from fully-treated Cannabis sativa cultivars. This results in an environmentally-friendly rope available in a wide variety of beautiful colours. Strong, heavy, and pleasingly dense in texture, hemp rope is consistently stronger than jute.
What type of hemp?
Most people think of yarn made from Cannabis sativa when they order hemp, which my hemp rope is indeed made from. Do be cautious as the term ‘hemp’ is often used as a generic term for anything from cotton and jute by others.
Where is it grown?
My single-origin hemp is bought from an independant grower in Romania: a country which has long been known for producing the highest quality hemp yarn in the world.
Making good yarn
Yarn for hemp rope can be made using one of two process:
- Untreated: the raw fibres are separated from the bark through a process called ‘retting’ and then spun into yarn - this creates a natural coloured yarn with a strong smell. Some people adore this smell, others hate it. The finished rope looks very similar to jute.
- Treated: after retting, the raw fibres are treated and turned into a pulp, removing all impurities prior to being spun into yarn. This results in a stronger, white yarn with no smell. Rope made from this yarn is sometimes called ‘hemp linen’, although the name has been used by some sellers to refer to cotton ropes.
My yarns are of the treated variety, meaning that I can make strong and colourful ropes without the strong odour.
How the yarn is turned into rope
I make all my rope by hand, using methods which date back thousands of years. This means that unlike with mass produced ropes I can ensure the consistency and quality of every rope that I make.
All my rope is made using three-strand twisted ropes. The other method for making ropes is to braid the yarns together through the use of industrial machines. This has the advantage of being quick and cheap - however it results in a far more slippery rope which doesn’t hold knots as safely as a twisted rope does. For this reason I only sell twisted ropes.
Three factors have a big impact on the quality of the final rope:
Rope can be made by twisting the strands either clockwise or counterclockwise, and this results in what is known as S-lay or Z-lay rope. Z-lay rope is slightly stronger than S-lay when made from natural fibres, and thus this is the most usual method for ropes under 10mm. Ropes above this diameter are sometimes made by twisting three smaller Z-lay ropes together in an anticlockwise direction to create an S-lay rope.
All the ropes I make are Z-lay.
Too tight a twist and the rope becomes so stiff that it becomes inflexible; too loose and the strands do not hold together. The looser a rope is, the harder it is to maintain, but the better the rope feels - getting just the right rope lay is an art form. My hemp ropes have a looser lay than the jute: this means that although they like a little more care and maintenance, they feel amazing.
When made only for industrial or garden applications, consistent thickness of a rope is far less of an issue than it is when using rope for Shibari. Because I use the highest quality yarns, my ropes are a consistent thickness along their entire length.