Abstract: This paper took 8 kinds of plain weave fabric as the research objects, including conventional polyester fabric, fine-denier hydrophilic polyester fabric, easy-to-dye polyester fabric, pure cotton fabric and polyester/cotton blended fabric. Kawabata Evaluation System for Fabric (KES-FB) was used for testing their properties such as tensile, shearing, bending, compressive and surface performance and for studying fabric styles. The results show that the pure polyester fabric has better anti-deformation ability, resilience and shape retention than pure cotton fabric and polyester/cotton blended fabric; the pure cotton fabric is superior in terms of draping property, gripping softness and smoothness, while the fine- denier hydrophilic polyester fabric has harder and more subtle handle.

Key words: polyester; cotton; blending; fabric; performance; style