Materials - silk

SILK, a traditionally luxurious and beautiful material, perfect for my product. Who knew there were so many types of silk!!!! I suppose its like paper, you just think there is one type until you start investigating. I had a silk dress and wanted the exact same type of silk as it. all I could find was dupion, silk mixes, habotai and endless more, but reading descriptions and trying to decide on pictures on the Internet was hopeless along with the fact there are no silk shops in Dundee. It is impossible to pick the right material if you a) don't know what it is called and b) do not have any samples of it. then after about 2 days of looking for silk stockists and typing in all sorts into Google to get some samples, I realised that I go to an art and design school that has a textiles department. OH MY GOD. The obvious thing was to go to the textiles department and ask them!!! a lesson for next time and for everybody else using new materials...ASK SOMEONE!! Armed with my silk dress and the name of the textile technician I asked him and within twenty minuets had a stockist and requested free samples of silk. I am using 100% black silk satin from Whaleys - Bradford. and silk satin organza for interfacing. Thank you Nori from textiles.