The Car Park Robe
SVRF · In development
A changing robe designed for a February car park in Cornwall, not a photoshoot in Portugal.
We drew our own pattern. It isn't made yet. This is where you find out when it is — the render above is a design render, not a photograph, and no production sample exists so far.
Most changing robes are the same coat with a different badge
A small number of factories make nearly all of them, and a large number of brands buy the stock body, print a logo on the chest and call it their own. That's why so many of them fit the same, feel the same, and fail in the same places.
We went to the factory that makes the best-known robe in the category, so the build quality is a known quantity — then did the part most brands skip, and drew our own pattern. Longer in the body, because the entire point is getting changed underneath it. Cut so the arms still work when you're wrestling a wet 5/4 off your shoulders. Storm cuffs, because cold water running down your forearm is the thing nobody bothers to fix.
Fifteen years designing outerwear for other people's brands went into it. This is the first one with our own name on the pattern.
Locked specification
- Recycled outer, 20,000 mm waterproof. Not shower-resistant. Waterproof, at a rating that means something.
- Fully taped seams. Stitch holes are where cheap waterproofs let go first.
- Hydrophobic-coated recycled micro fleece lining. Fleece that sheds water rather than drinking it, so it isn't still damp on Sunday.
- YKK AquaGuard zips throughout. Every zip, not just the front one.
- Mid-calf, lined storm hood, two zipped hand pockets, hem vents.
Get told when it's real
One email when there's a sample to photograph, and one when you can actually buy it. Nothing else, and no pretending there's a countdown.
Two emails, then we stop. Unsubscribe any time.
Where it actually is
Pattern and specification are locked. The manufacturer is confirmed and has quoted. What doesn't exist yet is a physical sample — that's the next thing to happen, and the thing everything else waits on.
Retail will be £95. People on this list hear first and pay less. That's the only advantage we can offer for being early, so we'd rather say it plainly than invent urgency.
No launch date, because we haven't got one worth giving you. When there's a sample in our hands, you'll get an email with photographs of it.
Running now
There's a Kickstarter live until 3 October funding the first production run. Backing it is the cheapest the robe will ever be, and it's all-or-nothing — if it doesn't fund, nobody is charged a penny.
In the meantime, the things that keep you warm on the walk back to the car already exist: the beanies and caps, the Core Hood, and the Changing Mat Towel that means you're not standing barefoot on gravel.
Or read what's actually out there in changing robes — the honest version of a category full of the same coat.