A hoodie that lasts a hundred years sounds like a senseless marketing gimmick. And it very well may be. Vollebak’s 100 Year Hoodie, though, sounds like it may really be up to the task.
Billed as a hoodie designed to outlive its owner, the garment boasts a build that relies on the same materials frequently used in “space suits, body armor, and aircraft carriers.” Yes, aircraft carriers. No, they didn’t make a hooded sweatshirt cut in the finest medieval armor. Instead, the darn thing is fashioned out of DuPont Kevlar, an aramid fiber which, we guess, does pass off as having been used in the construction of all three categories of products listed above.
Yes, that’s the same aramid fiber best known for its ballistic applications, having been widely used in helmets and body armor for military and law enforcement. For the Vollebak 100 Year Hoodie, however, they’ve taken that same material and spun it into a super soft knit that should feel as comfortable as any sweatshirt you regularly rely on during the chillier months of the year.
While most Kevlar-based garments has it blended with other technical materials, this one doesn’t. Instead, it’s 100 percent Kevlar fleece at the body and Kevlar rib at the cuffs, hem, and underarm paneling, so it bears the full characteristics of the extraordinarily strong fabric. According to Vollebak, the darn thing should be strong enough, bare minimum, to survive 2,000 washes, 4,000 wears, and 100 accidents, along with surviving even the extreme temperatures on Mars’ poles (because if it survives a 100 years, there’s a slim chance we’ll have colonized Mars by then). By the way, if you manage to survive 100 accidents with your whole body still intact, make sure to write a book about it because that’s absolutely insane.
Instead of being dyed to color like most clothes, the Vollebak 100 Year Hoodie has been left in the fabric’s raw pale yellow state. This gives the garment a really well-worn and lived-in look, especially once exposed to sunlight. Suffice to say, if you want your sweatshirt to look like it’s been through its fair share of adventures, this achieves that without having to actually rough it up whatsoever.
This comes with a fully-lined hood, by the way, so the darn thing should wear comfortably, complete with a heavy-duty drawcord that will probably hold up as well as the rest of the garment. As with all hoodies, it gets a generously-sized kangaroo front pocket for stashing your daily supply of gear.
Will this thing last a 100 years? We don’t know. Unless you can live a full century after purchasing this item, of course, you’ll never know either. And if it ever does survive your lifetime and it gets handed down to your next generation, you’ll probably be so old by the time you give it away that you’ve forgotten about the 100-year guarantee and, to be honest, won’t really give a hoot either way.
A part of Vollebak’s 100Y range, the 100 Year Hoodie is priced at $295.