Be prepared for some work disassembling them! I have been buying wool clothing from the thrift stores to make a braided rug for in front of our new woodstove.

The Pendletons are REALLY well constructed! Some items rip apart fairly quick, then there are the Pendletons. Did I say they are well constructed garments????

Shirts may be easier than jackets though ;-)

Only wash in hot water if you want to felt them. My dad wore Pendleton shirts and they did fine in cold wash and VERY low setting to dry.

Many antique quilts were made with wool, so it can be done. If I were going to make a quilt with wool, I would wash in cold water on gentle first, and line dry. That would hopefully keep "felting" to a minimum. Wool that is felted is thicker and I think it would be harder to work with for quilting purposes.

But if you do the cold water/hang to dry, you would have to be careful that the quilt would ALWAYS be washed in that manner.

Probably you should cut the sleeves off of one of the shirts and wash one in hot, dry in the dryer, and then wash the other in cold and hang to dry. You can see how the process affects them, and you can try out sewing with the fabric that is treated both ways, and decide what will work best for you.

After my father passed away, each of the kids chose their favorite pendelton shirt and my neice made a beautiful memory bear for each of us. I got the rest of the shirts and because I'm also into felting, I washed them in hot hot water and dried them in the drier. No dice. Even tho the labels said dry clean only, they didn't felt (shrink) at all. These were purchased in the 50's - 80's. So go ahead, wash & dry them and use them in a quilt. When I repurpose items of clothing I don't bother to rip the seams. I just cut them out.

I machine washed Pendleton wool yardage - in tepid (approximately body temperature) to cool water - rinsed in the same temp water - and machine dried on permanent press/low setting - and took it out of the dryer when it was BARELY dry.

Turned out beautifully. No shrinkage. No color loss. (I did hold my breath while I was doing this - I figured sheep get wet)

HOWEVER, if you want to SHRINK WOOL - over agitate it, use hot water, shock it by putting it in a cold rinse. Works almost every time.