Article content

Since its launch in Canada in 2016, Uniqlo has expanded its presence to include 18 stores across the country, with a 19th opening this month in Edmonton.

The Japanese retailer, which celebrates its 40th anniversary next year and whose parent company, Fast Retailing, is the third-largest fashion manufacturer and retailer in the world, just behind Inditex (Zara) and H&M, continues to cause a stir with its new stores. This summer in both Ottawa and Calgary, new store openings drew huge queues, as customers clamoured for the brand’s no-nonsense basics in a rainbow of bold, wearable colours.

Article content

Article content

The queues are even longer for fashion-forward collections by designers such as JW Anderson, Marni and — just last month — Clare Waight Keller, the former Givenchy and Chloé designer who is also the woman responsible for Meghan Markle’s wedding dress.

Of all Uniqlo’s ranges, Heattech is one Canadian often reach for in the winter. For the uninitiated, Heattech is exactly what its name implies: Fabric technology that helps us stay warm. Think thermals — but make them fashion — and, of course, affordable.

Heattech first launched 20 years ago, with just one men’s turtleneck, a style deemed the ultimate winter essential for the fact that it was often worn both on its own and under other layers.

Since 2003, the range has expanded dramatically and now includes Heattech Extra Warm and Heattech Ultra Warm, offering pieces that are 1.5 to 2.25 times warmer, respectively, than standard Heattech.

At Uniqlo headquarters in Ariake, Tokyo, where the design, corporate and centralized customer service teams are based, along with a series of photo shoot studios and an impressive cafeteria for staff, a special installation showcases Heattech’s evolution over the years, including the Heattech x Alexander Wang collection from 2018 and more recent pieces from its collaboration with Marni.

Article content

Article content

“We are always thinking [about] what is the next, future essential item for customers,” says Yuki Katsuta, the Global Head of Research & Development at Uniqlo. “We are always developing what is going to be more useful or comfortable for our customers in the future, especially in fabrication.”

A study conducted by Uniqlo during Paris Fashion Week in March found that 78 per cent of survey respondents, which included a mix of passersby and industry attendees, had worn Uniqlo before — and of that, more than half had specifically worn Heattech.

What’s more, 58 per cent of these individuals wore Heattech as innerwear daily, which makes sense given that the collections tend to focus on both men’s and women’s layering pieces: T-shirts, long-sleeved shirts, long johns, turtlenecks and camisoles.

But how exactly does Heattech work? Like most thermals, Heattech traps body heat and prevents it from escaping.

The best thermal materials provide further insulation by converting body moisture — a.k.a. sweat — into heat, which is how Heattech works. Essentially, as moisture particles begin to evaporate, Heattech’s rayon fibres quickly absorb them, converting their kinetic energy into thermal energy, or heat.

Article content

At the same time, air particles within Heattech’s micro-acrylic fibres trap the heat by making the material adiabatic — meaning no heat is transferred in or out. In addition to rayon and micro-acrylic fibres, Heattech also contains polyurethane, for stretch and comfort, and polyester, which is quick-drying and also aids in the moisture absorption process.

The technology for Heattech was developed by Uniqlo and one of its fabric partners, Toray, a materials innovation company founded in Tokyo in 1926.

The two had worked together to launch Dry, Uniqlo’s line of sweat-wicking summer innerwear, in the early 2000s, around the same time as Nike’s DRI-Fit technology exploded. (These days, Uniqlo’s Dry technology has evolved into what’s now called Airism, which, like Heattech, is wildly popular during the relevant seasons.)

With the success of this synthetic fibre, the teams quickly saw the potential for others like it, far beyond workout wear, including winter clothing.

At the time, although synthetics had seen a huge rise in global clothing manufacturing through the 1970s and 1980s, thermals had long been made from cotton, wool or a combination of the two. And when it came to combating the cold, common wisdom was to layer up with thick, heavy clothing. Of course, there were advances and innovations along the way (down fill, Gore-Tex and other wind-resistant nylons among them), but winter outfits still tended to be heavy and hard to move in.

Article content

Uniqlo sought to solve this precise problem, tasking Toray to create a thin, comfortable material that would also retain heat to help keep people warm.

After more than 10,000 prototypes, Heattech was launched, and as it has evolved over the past 20 years, its fibres have become even finer, which gives the material its smooth hand feel, and more concentric, allowing for a denser concentration of air pockets which help retain warmth.

Today, the fabric continues to be tested, and a weather simulation chamber at Uniqlo’s Tokyo office helps to visualize and compare the effectiveness of a standard cotton versus a Heattech T-shirt. A visit to the office allowed me to step into the chamber: the 20-degree room is cool and comfortable, while the minus 5-degree room is a similar, albeit milder version, of what Canadians are used to in winter.

Participants typically spend 20 minutes in the warm room to acclimatize before performing some light exercise; they are then moved to the cold room for five minutes to gauge how their clothing responds to perspiration, before a final stint in the warm room. The experiment is repeated while the person wears different clothing, and thermal imaging and qualitative sensory surveys are conducted throughout.

Article content

Besides its technology, the main thing that sets Heattech apart from other thermals is its price. A women’s Heattech Ultra Warm turtleneck and leggings, the warmest available from Uniqlo, cost $39.90 each, while a merino long-sleeved base layer by Smartwool, or a similar style by Patagonia, will set you back upwards of $120.

Even the base layer bottoms from MEC’s in-house brand start at $49.95, while a pair by Icebreaker hits more around the $150 mark.

It’s not surprising, then, that Uniqlo has sold more than one billion Heattech pieces over the past 20 years. In some cities, it’s so popular that the retailer struggles to keep Heattech in stock past the end of October.

Back in 2017, Uniqlo also launched vending machines in 10 U.S. airports, with a Heattech shirt among the items sold. It all speaks to the easy-to-buy, easy-to-wear versatility of the range — and why it feels a bit like a no-brainer when it comes to keeping warm this winter.

Postmedia News was a guest of Uniqlo in Japan. The brand neither reviewed nor approved this article.

Bookmark our website and support our journalism: Don’t miss the news you need to know — add VancouverSun.com and TheProvince.com to your bookmarks and sign up for our newsletters here.

You can also support our journalism by becoming a digital subscriber: For just $14 a month, you can get unlimited, ad-lite get unlimited, ad-lite access to The Vancouver Sun, The Province, National Post and 13 other Canadian news sites. Support us by subscribing today: The Vancouver Sun | The Province.

Article content