Waterfallproof Jacket

The Waterfallproof Jacket is designed to combat the megastorms of the future, where crazily intense rainfall becomes the norm. Highly waterproof, windproof and breathable, it’s constructed with an advanced 3 layer Swiss material from Schoeller, with an intelligent membrane that opens and closes in the heat, and self-drying nanotechnology borrowed from plants. Building the material alone requires a total of 28 separate construction processes.

The outside of the Waterfallproof Jacket mimics one of nature’s most brilliant pieces of engineering – the lotus leaf. Over millions of years the lotus leaf has adapted to life constantly surrounded by water. Although the surface of each leaf looks completely flat, it’s covered with a complex landscape of microscopic bumps which helps it stay clean and dry.

The issue with creating something crazily waterproof is breathability. The more water can’t come through one way, the harder it is to let it come out the other. A rubber wetsuit for instance would never let any rain through, but if you tried to go for a run in one you might pass out as it won’t let heat or sweat escape efficiently. So the middle layer of the jacket uses Schoeller’s c_change® membrane. Instead of remaining static, the membrane can open and close to respond to different weather conditions as they happen, while remaining permanently waterproof and windproof.

As the air temperature rises, the membrane opens up so that excess sweat and heat can escape through the jacket. But while the membrane’s polymer structure opens up to become extremely permeable to water vapour leaving the body, it remains completely waterproof on the outside. It means that even if you held a jacket under a downpour in extreme heat, the jacket will only ever let the water through one way, while still letting heat pass through it.

While every zipper on the Waterfallproof Jacket is built to cope with extreme volumes of rain, we’ve fitted the jacket with a chest pocket that can survive total immersion in water. Even if you’re wading in chest deep water, anything inside it will stay dry. It’s built with an incredibly heavy-duty waterproof zipper that looks a bit like a rubber anchor and is normally only found in scuba diving gear. Just as no water could get in, no water could get out. So if you’ve always wanted to take your pet goldfish out for a walk, fill up the pocket and now you can.

The jacket will stretch with you whatever you’re doing. But instead of relying on elastane, we use an advanced weaving process which creates mechanical stretch to achieve the same effect. Articulated sleeves follow the natural shape of your arm. And you’ll find three laser cut vents under each arm to help keep air flowing around your body when you’re working hard.