Dressing for Winter, Part 1
January 22nd, 2005,According to a Norwegian saying, there is no bad weather, only bad clothes. If we want to enjoy all weather here in the Upper Midwest, where the climate is colder than Norway’s, we’d better have darn good clothes.
This week I’ll discuss newer types of winter clothing that feature high-tech fabrics like Polartec and Capilene. Next week I’ll give other tips for cold-weather clothing that are the result of hard-earned experience.
I don’t intend the following to sound like a consumer guide for expensive, brand-name clothing. Instead, I mean to provide some knowledge that will help people to enjoy winter more, especially if they are outside exercising. In our technological age, clothing, like everything else, is changing quickly.
The New Model for Winter Wear
The older models of winter clothing worked fine for the most part. Native Americans survived for millennia wearing animal skins and furs. For all I know, there still may not be anything invented that’s as warm as fur. Native Americans invented their own mittens, boots, and coats with hoods, and we would do well to keep those innovations.
European immigrants added other fabrics such as cotton and wool, and they even wore long underwear made of the latter. By the time I was a kid in the 1970’s, nylon, polyester, and other artificial fabrics were common. We also had down insulation (bird feathers, if you didn’t already know). The down coat was probably one of the more important clothing innovations available at that time–a coat with a wind-breaking outer fabric and down insulation sewn into the lining. I still wear down coats today and find them to be warmer than thinner artificial insulations such as Thinsulate.
Although closing based on the old models worked well, it was heavy, bulky, and did not dry quickly. Today there are still more new fabrics that have led to what I’m calling the new model of winter wear. In 1979, Malden Mills invented Polar Fleece, the polyester fabric that made living in winter easier. Polar Fleece and similar fabrics are one of the greatest recent inventions in cold-weather clothing: they are lightweight, insulate well, and dry quickly.
Cold-weather clothing made from the new high-tech fabrics can be divided roughly into three categories: 1) underwear that is designed to be worn next to your skin and carry or “wick” moisture away from your body so that it can evaporate; 2) an insulating layer (or layers) that is warm but still releases moisture, sometimes called a “soft shell”; and 3) an outer layer or “hard shell” that provides protection from the wind (and, as a disadvantage, usually doesn’t release moisture from your body). Thus the new model for really cold weather has at least these three layers, with the option to add more layers of insulation if necessary.
Some brand names for the new underwear are Malden Mills’ Polartec, Patagonia’s Capilene, and Marmot’s Infinity. All are designed to keep you dry, because if you are sweating and the moisture stays on clothing that is against your skin, your body will lose heat faster and you’ll feel colder. Don’t forget that socks and hats are against your skin as well; these too can be made of the high-tech fabrics.
For insulation layers, brand names include Gore and Polartec, which both make new insulation that is also supposed to protect against the wind. For the outer layer, Gore-Tex is a leading brand that is waterproof and windproof.
Good manufacturers of outdoor winter clothing–companies like Patagonia, Marmot, and North Face–will make use of these new fabrics, as will less expensive store-brand clothing from retailers such as REI, Galyan’s, and Midwest Mountaineering. It won’t hurt to check the labels to see what fabrics are used.
The “new model” of winter clothing is something that I’m slowly adapting to. I’m sure many younger folks have known only this model, while many older folks are getting by on the old one. I have some doubts that it’s really possible to stay warm without a down coat in the Upper Midwestern winter, but for the most part the new approach seems to make sense.
It isn’t cheap to get the new stuff, but because it’s lighter and keeps you drier (and therefore warmer) it’s probably worth the extra cost. If you’re not outside exercising in winter, it’s less necessary to get the new fabrics. But even if you’re only running errands, you can sometimes work up a sweat while wearing heavy clothing and going in and out of a car and buildings. The new fabrics will keep you more comfortable in that situation as well.
Stranger stuff lies ahead for the future of winter wear. Polartec already makes something it calls Heat Technology, a kind of “electronic textile” that uses rechargeable batteries to provide heat via a garment. Someday even this may seem normal.
Weather Notes
You may have heard about the frigid low temperature in Embarrass, Minnesota, on January 17: minus 54 degrees, only six degrees higher than the state record set in Tower, the next town north of Embarrass. We were considerably warmer here in Northfield, where it was only 15 below. However, the lack of snow cover continued to cause trouble even here. We awoke the morning of the 17th to find that our cable TV and Internet service was out. The ground had most likely heaved and severed the line as the frost continued to penetrate deep into the ground. A new orange cable now snakes across the yard, waiting for spring before it can be buried.