Indestructible Chinos

Name: 100 Year T Shirt. Long Sleeve White edition
Brand: Vollebak
SKU: TPS031WHTXSM
Price: 145 GBP
Availability: InStock

We’ve taken the world’s most dependable pants, and made them even more dependable.

£395

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Strengthened with Dyneema®
Pockets reinforced with Cordura
Garment washed for softness

Like most men’s clothing, chinos emerged from war. They were slim-fitting, flat-fronted, functional, and most importantly… really really dependable. By 1902, after heavy field-testing, they’d been made an official part of the US Army uniform. Once World War II was over, the guys who’d fought went off to college still wearing them – turning them into an instant hit on the Ivy League campuses. And their reputation was only cemented as a staple of mid-century menswear when they became the standard issue kit for John F. Kennedy and Steve McQueen.

Which is why, 120+ years later, you still don’t need to mess with the design. So we haven’t. Instead we’ve taken pants you’ve always been able to rely on, and woven them with the strongest fibre on Earth… so you can rely on them even more.

While they look and feel like regular chinos, every pair of Indestructible Chinos is made with a blend of cotton and Dyneema® – which is the same stuff used in body armour, arctic ropes and the sides of tanks. Of course you’d never know this just by putting them on. The Dyneema® is woven in with the cotton during the weaving process, so you’ll only ever feel the softness of the cotton, not the strength of the Dyneema®. And they’ve also been garment washed so they feel lived in from day one.

100 Year T Shirt

Built with Japanese Cordura it’s 14x tougher than a regular cotton t shirt.

£145

100 Year T Shirt. Long Sleeve White edition

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Technical Details

Material made in Japan: 60% cotton, 40% polyamide (Cordura)

Highly abrasion resistant

Fast drying

Rib collar and cuffs

Material weighs 160g/m2

T shirt weighs 210 grams

Machine wash 40°C

Constructed in Portugal

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A t shirt made to outlive you

The reality of most cotton t shirts is that after a few years they start to break down, then they’re thrown out. The 100 Year T Shirt is different. While it looks like a regular cotton t shirt, and feels just like a regular cotton t shirt, it’s made from a material so strong it was originally developed for military combat uniforms.

Built with military grade Japanese Cordura

To build the 100 Year T Shirt we’ve worked with a military grade Japanese material that combines soft cotton with Cordura. As a high tenacity Nylon, Cordura is normally found in protective panels on motorcycle gear and hiking boots, not in t shirts. But we’ve found a way of incorporating enough high strength fibres to radically enhance the performance of the t shirt, but without losing the softness of the cotton.

14x tougher than a regular cotton t shirt
Some revolutions look more revolutionary than others. The only way you’d know how strong the 100 Year T Shirt is, is by putting it to the test. We use the Martindale abrasion resistance test on all our 100 Year gear to simulate decades of wear and tear. A mechanical thumb rubs the surface of the fabric repeatedly until the fibres start to break. A normal cotton t shirt which might last around 5 to 15 years typically survives less than 7,000 revolutions. The 100 Year T Shirt’s fabric easily reached 100,000 cycles, where the test stops. Which makes it over 14x stronger than regular cotton.

The t shirt balances extreme durability with comfort
It’s all very well making a t shirt that’s tough enough to outlive you, but it also has to be comfortable enough for you to want to spend the rest of your life in it. So the 100 Year T Shirt is built from a highly abrasion resistant knit that blends soft cotton with military grade fibres.

Designed to help keep your skin on

Abrasion resistance doesn’t just help to increase the lifespan of clothing. It’s also designed to keep your skin attached to your body. Whether you're lugging climbing rope over your shoulder, you come off your bike on a downhill track, or your bag's shifting up and down on your back on a long run, that’s all abrasion. So wearing highly abrasion resistant clothing gives you the best chance of coming home from an adventure with your clothes and your skin intact.

Fast drying and wicking
The material the t shirt is made from is moisture wicking – which means it absorbs any sweat and quickly pulls it to the outside of the material, letting it evaporate to keep you drier and more comfortable. It also means it dries out quickly after washing or if you get caught out in rain.

Detailing designed to last
The entire t shirt is made from the same high strength material, including the rib collar and the cuffs. And it’s held together with dense twin needle stitching. We’ve also set the shoulder seams further forward than you’d normally find them to protect them if you’re carrying a heavy backpack.

Our 100 year range is the toughest gear we make

For our 100 Year range we use advances in material technology to make clothes with a longer life expectancy than the people wearing them – it’s clothing designed to make its way to your grandkids, not to landfill. That’s why all our 100 Year gear is made from materials with properties that normal clothes simply don’t have – from fire resistance to extreme strength.