Air-conditioned clothing is exploding as the quirky, hip new trend: ‘It’s not exactly fashionable’

This hot and new style is literally blowing up.

Air-conditioned clothing may be the most interesting trend to hit the market and provide relief in the low temperatures.

Japan-based Anrealage, led by designer Kunihiko Morinaga, breathed new life into nylon garments for its Spring/Summer 2025 collection at Paris Fashion Week.

The brand introduced a line of inflatable clothing that ballooned as models walked the runway, each piece powered by fan technology from Kuchofuku, a company that makes cooling clothing.

“By showing air-conditioned clothes in Paris, we hope to be able to suggest new physical forms, but also a sustainable solution for hot weather,” Morinaga told Vogue Business.

Twenty years ago, Kuchofuku, founded by former Sony engineer Hiroshi Ichigaya, debuted its cooling work jackets, which operate via two fans on either side of the wearer’s waist and are widely used by Japanese hard-collar workers. blue over the years to keep them fresh. in the scorching summer months, a multi-million dollar market.

However, many mainstream brands have borrowed Ichigaya’s cutting-edge design, such as Nike x Off-White and others, an effort on behalf of Kuchofuku to expand its customer base beyond industrial sectors.

“Our mission is to spread the word about air-conditioned clothing to a wider audience,” Tomoyuki Iwabuchi, the company’s PR officer, told Vogue. “Now we’re getting to a point where it’s becoming part of the lifestyle and the fashion world.”

Japanese menswear label Meanwhile introduced the technology to clothing after designer Naohiro Fujisaki saw the jackets on industrial workers and “thought it could be incorporated into fashion and everyday life,” he told Vogue.

“In Japan, there’s a strong impression that it’s for people who work on construction sites and it’s not exactly fashionable, so the challenge for Japanese customers is how we can evolve the design; but overseas, it’s seen as the new, more modern functional clothing,” he said.

While air-conditioned clothing is becoming more mainstream, it has meanwhile “sold more than last year,” he said, adding that the company has sold every collection of air-conditioned clothing – currently priced at over $1,000 – every season.

“People appreciate the mix of [style and] technology, but at this point in time I think it’s too much of a curiosity,” Ian Paley, owner of UK-based Garbstore, which sells Meanwhile jackets in his boutique, told Vogue.

He thinks this is just the beginning for air conditioning technology in clothing.

“We are at the beginning of it. “The technology of the ventilation jackets is currently at its most crude,” he said. “I think there is a long arc ahead, but I can certainly see a time when it becomes more normal, and it will happen first in Japan.”

Hidesign, a Japanese company that makes work uniforms, also launched an air-conditioned version of the clothes for spring/summer 2025, and the company told Vogue that it is working to minimize the “bulky, bloated shape” of the clothes for its collections. next. .

It’s a balancing act, though, as the lack of airflow inside the garment defeats its cooling purpose.

“I actually bought the Air Flow jacket for myself this season,” said Souta Yamaguchi, fashion director at Hidesign who was previously a designer at Anrealage. “I’m just going to wear it on the street because it’s cool, and people around me say it’s cool too.”

Meanwhile’s team proved this theory true while in Paris for men’s fashion season, when the troupe had air-conditioned jackets in the City of Light where passers-by “asked” for the clothes.

“I get the impression that people are quite interested in the technology, they think it’s amazing,” Fujisaki said.