Breakdown of Skjortan är av bomull.
vara
to be
skjortan
the shirt
av
of, by / from (cause)
bomullen
the cotton
Questions & Answers about Skjortan är av bomull.
Why do we use av here instead of a word for "made"?
In Swedish, the preposition av is all you need to express what material an object is composed of. While English requires "made of", Swedish simply says that the object "is of" (är av) the material.
Could I say Skjortan är gjord av bomull to match the English translation?
Yes, adding gjord (made) is grammatically correct and means exactly the same thing. However, dropping gjord and just using är av is very common and natural in everyday Swedish.
Why isn't there an article before bomull?
Just like in English, materials and substances like bomull (cotton), trä (wood), or plast (plastic) are usually uncountable nouns. When you are talking about the material in general, you don't use an article like en or ett.
Is bomull a compound word? The second half looks like "wool".
Yes, it is! Ull means "wool", and bom comes from an old Germanic word for "tree" (related to the German word Baum). So bomull literally translates to "tree wool", which is a great mnemonic for remembering the word for cotton.