Technical Abstract: Addition of flax fibers with cotton in blends can provide improved properties, especially in moisture absorbance. The commercial method of retting flax, i.e., dew-retting, results in flax of inconsistent properties, and lack of standards creates difficulties in optimizing textile mills for use of flax fibers. Enzyme-retting is being explored, and laboratory and pilot plant tests have indicated the potential for this method to produce light-colored fibers fo good quality. Future work will address optimizing the enzyme formulation and integration of retting with commercial cleaning systems in a pilot plant operation for specific fiber properties. Simultaneously, modifying dew-retted flax fibers through use of specific enzymes for improved flax-cotton blends is being explores.