Over the years, the windbreaker has come in many shapes and sizes and, definitely, a lot more colors than the classic 1980s zip up windbreaker jacket! The HoloGear Jacket is a versatile windbreaker jacket that you can incorporate in a number of different styles from sportswear, casual and streetwear.
Thanks to the holographic reflective technology embedded in, the HoloGear jacket is perfect for activities that require you to be seen like when cycling alongside a busy road. The HoloGear also makes you feel much safer running, especially in the darker mornings and evenings of winter.
The HoloGear Jacket has a pullover design with a high neck hoodie that integrates a 78cm long nylon string capped with hard plastic ends. The hoodie string features inline leather cinches designed to cinch up the hoodie similarly to a drawstring, although not as securely. The leather cinches measure 3cm long and 1.5cm wide.
Both the leather cinches and string ends also prevent the hoodie string from coming out of the hoodie, which can easily happen by pulling on it accidentally or when putting the hoodie through washing machine. After the string comes out of a hoodie, trying to insert it back in is virtually impossible, unless you use a hack for restringing a hoodie.
There are various workarounds for rethreading a hoodie, although the easiest hoodie string hack, by far, is the straw and stapler for stapling the hoodie string to one end of the straw to effortlessly pass-through the hoodie string in less than 60 seconds.
As long as the string ends don't come loose, it's not likely (if not impossible) that the string on the hoodie of the HoloGear Jacket will ever come out. The hoodie string hole openings are fairly small too and, they're reinforced with metal eyelets.
The HoloGear Jacket integrates only one zipper, which is a YTT #7 Y-style corn teeth metal zipper with a 42cm long by 1.5cm wide zipper seam. Being a half zip pullover windbreaker jacket, the zipper is designed to open up lower down the chest. Depending on the length of your torso, the half zipper will open between the sternum and navel.
Because of the long half zipper, the HoloGear Jacket is comfortable to wear even if you prefer windbreaker jackets with a full zipper.
The HoloGear Jacket is made of thin 100% nylon fabric (15-denier) and, just like most windbreaker jackets, the HoloGear Jacket is very lightweight, weighing just 334 grams. The HoloGear Jacket does a good job at repelling wind and light rain, thanks to nylon's water resistant properties.
Being 100% nylon though, the HoloGear Jacket also produces the classic "swishy/rustling" noise when you walk in nylon clothing.
The shell of the HoloGear Jacket is very thin and doesn't have lining or padding; hence it does not generate warmth like a thicker jacket would do to keep you warm. That said, there is a section of felt lining found at the base of the hoodie designed to keep the neck jawline warm.
The technology behind the HoloGear Jacket is "holographic", which works similarly to a hi-visibility (high vis) yellow vest, although the HoloGear Jacket does not react to the sun's ultraviolet rays the same way yellow safety vest do, which produce a fluorescent-like glow in broad daylight and a reflective light at night when a light source hits the yellow vest.
The HoloGear Jacket, in the other hand, appears black during the day and reflective at night in direct light. Depending on the angle the light source hits, the HoloGear Jacket emits a different type of glow.
The HoloGear Jacket has HoloGear branding showing on the bottom left side of the jacket and in the mid-section of the back of the jacket. On the underside of the HoloGear Jacket, there is more HoloGear branding with large text and logo decal, which appears to be made using iron heat transfer paper material.
The HoloGear branding text uses custom all-caps fonts. Country of manufacturing and care instructions are also boldly printed on the underside of the HoloGear Jacket. There is no mention whether the HoloGear Jacket can be cool wash in a washing machine so, hand washing is to be assumed.
The HoloGear Jacket is currently sold in the grey/ black holographic colorway pictured on this review. The holographic top section of the HoloGear Jacket has a networking grid style effect that looks like dark green camouflage in low light.
The bottom half section of the HoloGear Jacket has a solid grey color finish. The holographic material of the HoloGear Jacket doesn't have the same properties as the included glow stick band; hence the HoloGear Jacket does not store and emit light in the dark like the glow stick does.
The HoloGear Jacket internal seams are sewn together using machine overcasting stitch, which encloses unfinished edges, giving the seams a neater, smoother finish so, the seams don't rub against the skin.
The HoloGear Jacket is a brand new product that was recently an Indiegogo campaign and the HoloGear Jacket will be available to buy next month July 2020. The jacket is available in small, medium, large, X-large and XX-large.
The HoloGear Jacket pictured on this review is large size with the following dimensions: 57cm long sleeves from wrist to armpit, 64cm long from armpit to armpit and 71cm tall from neck to bottom of jacket, which has a drop cut tail so, the backside of the HoloGear Jacket is slightly longer than the front side to create a tail effect.
The rim of the bottom of the jacket measures 63cm wide, while the hoodie measures 35cm tall with a 26cm depth approximately.
The dual entry kangaroo pass-through pocket measures 50cm from end to end, while the pockets have 5cm wide openings. The HoloGram brand logos on the front and back measure 4.5cm long and 2cm tall.
The HoloGear Jacket works great as a warm up jacket and light exercise, although it's worth bearing in mind that other than the V-neck zipper there aren't any breathable panels so, with heavy workouts the jacket will get sweaty eventually.
There is no indication on whether the holographic material will wear off after x number of washes like the reflective panels on most running/cycling jackets.