Fibre encyclopedia
Bamboo
Also called bamboo · bambu · bamboo viscose · viskosa bambu · bamboo rayon · rayon bambu
There is no textile fibre called bamboo in the labelling rules. Cloth sold as bamboo is nearly always viscose whose pulp came from bamboo.
Class
Regenerated
Comes from
From dissolved plant pulp
Where it comes from
Bamboo enters cloth in two very different ways. The common one is dissolving pulp: the plant is broken down chemically and spun again, which makes the fibre viscose, and European labelling rules require it to be named viscose rather than bamboo. The rare one is mechanical, where the fibre is separated from the stem as flax is, and the result behaves like a stem fibre.
How it feels to wear
Air
Air moves through the fibre easily
Water
Takes water into the fibre
Heat
Lets body heat go
Stretch
No stretch of its own
Wear
Wears down sooner under rubbing
Where the cloth is bamboo viscose, it behaves as viscose: it absorbs more than cotton, it is weak while wet, and it drapes. Where it is mechanically separated bamboo, it behaves as a stem fibre, closer to linen. The two share a plant and almost nothing else, and the values here describe the viscose route because that is what nearly all of it is.
Care
- Treat it as viscose: hand wash cool, do not wring, dry flat.
- Dry in shade.
If the label says bamboo and gives no fibre name beside it, the safe assumption for washing is viscose.
End of life
Recycling route
Chemical recycling
As cellulose it belongs to the same dissolving route as viscose, at the same small scale.
In a blend
Bamboo viscose is usually knitted with elastane for stretch, which closes the cellulose route.
Skin notes
Mechanical
Bamboo viscose is smooth fine fibre with no mechanical prickle route. Mechanically separated bamboo is stiff, like a stem fibre.
Chemical
Dye and finish are undeclared, as they are for viscose.
If your skin reacts to a garment, a dermatologist and patch testing are what can answer it. A label cannot, and neither can this page.
What the label cannot tell you
A label that says bamboo does not tell you which of the two materials you are holding, and they differ in almost everything except the name of the plant.
Sources
- Regulation (EU) No 1007/2011 on textile fibre names and related labelling, Annex I. Checked 22 August 2026
- ISO 2076:2021, Textiles, man-made fibres, generic names. Checked 22 August 2026
- European Commission Joint Research Centre, techno-scientific assessment of the management options for used and waste textiles in the European Union, 2023
Written from primary sources and in our own words. Where a figure could not be traced to a source anyone can open, it is not printed here.
Read the label you are holding
The scan surface reads one care label and names which questions it answers and which it leaves out. A passport says for one specific piece what a label cannot: the composition with its percentages, where the cloth came from, who worked on it, how to repair it and where it goes next.