Inside Outdoor Winter 2018

Outdoor enthusiasts sweat the most intimate details on the technical apparel they wear to pursue their passions. Preferenc- es about zipper placement, hood size and cuff style pit one brand’s technical shell against another in often-contentious debates over which option is “better.” Convinced that they will be warm, comfortable and protect- ed from the elements, looking good rises to the top of the pur- chase criteria checklist. Color is often the deciding factor. Since standards such as green or blue lack any emotional appeal, apparel brands turn to word- craft to inspire buyers. Green becomes mint, shamrock, em- erald or fern. Blue is replaced with turquoise, azure, sapphire and royal blue. Product design- ers can pick from thousands of shades for colors to differenti- ate their brands and match the current fashion trends. After a nod to fashion and style, product designs add black fabric components to complement colors and finish the construction. A technical shell’s back panels and cor- responding pants or bibs are usually offered in black. A simple, straightforward color. Black is only black, right? Surprisingly to most people outside of supply chain manag- ers, black is a complicated color. Although there are dozens of formulas to create the color black, the finished products are often compromised, inconsistent, and use dyeing and manufacturing processes outside of a brand’s control. All are dark, but some are bluer, some are redder, some are greener, and some are yellower when compared to each other, or when compared to a theoretical blackpoint in color space. The problem gets more complex when different sup- pliers are used to create a consistent black with different fabrics. In garment production, there are aspects of color that need to be controlled so the color differences are not seen. Differences in lightness, green- ness, redness, blueness, yel- lowness, and chromaticity all need to be minimized so that two complementary fabrics, such as a velour fabric or a fleece fabric, is acceptable to a very shiny woven cire’d fabric. Technical apparel brands in the outdoor industry have had a long-standing need for a simple, accurate, reproduc- ible black. Despite years of experimentation, innovation and hard-won improvements, there’s still a long way to go to reach that objective. Consistent Color Color consistency of a tech- nical garment means that all materials and components look acceptably close to each other and that there be no glaring dif- ferences in hue, chromaticity or lightness between sewn compo- nentry of the garments in store light (point of sale) and daylight or fluorescent office light (ev- eryday use). This task is hard to manage well, and current production methods can’t control all of the variables that influence fabric dyeing and construction. Product designers are thus left with no choice but to leave those deci- sions to suppliers, which use their own proprietary processes and formulas with little collabora- tion with each other or the brand. “Although there are dozens of formulas to create the color black, the finished products are often compromised, inconsistent, and use dyeing and manufacturing processes outside of a brand’s control.” By Lou Dzierzak The Many Shades of Black Product managers search for a simple, accurate, reproducible black FLOOR SPACE Color can often look different when applied to different fabrics. Even basic black has wide variations. Inside Outdoor | Winter 2018 16