Most recipes require Carded Cotton, or require a different textile that requires Carded Cotton to make. At first, you can only created Carded Cotton by hand, with no chance of Perfect Cotton. As you gain level and buy better Carded Cotton recipes, the time required per Carded and the amount of Perfect Cotton increases. At Master (level 45), you can take advantage of a recipe that changes the Cotton requirement from 5 to 4, giving you a 25% boost to production.