Space Jacket

I do not like being hot, sweaty, or uncomfortable. I have always been the kind of person who tries to remove small sources of discomfort from everyday life rather than simply accept them. During summer trips around Japan, I kept seeing people wearing jackets with fans built into them. Eventually I bought one myself, and it genuinely changed the way I experienced hot weather. For the conditions they are designed for, they work surprisingly well.

That made me want to build one properly. I was already travelling to China for another hardware project, so we stole a few hours across a couple of days at the trade fairs to walk through the relevant sections, understand the technology, and find suppliers. That was enough to establish a sourcing path for the fans. Back in India, I worked with a local factory on the garment itself, and we eventually produced around 200 units.

The project has also made the limitations of fan cooling much clearer to me. Airflow is very effective when evaporation can still do the cooling, but there is a point in sufficiently extreme conditions where simply moving more hot air stops solving the problem. I have become increasingly interested in going beyond airflow entirely and building real active cooling into clothing. Right now I am researching thermoelectric systems using Peltier devices. They are horribly inefficient and would need a lot of battery, but they can actually move heat instead of depending only on the environment.

That is ultimately what interests me about Space Jacket. I do not want to frame it mainly as a market opportunity. I think physical comfort gives people a basic level of dignity. We already expect clothes to protect us from cold and rain. I would like clothing to become much better at protecting us from heat as well. It also happens to combine almost everything I enjoy building: fashion, electronics, industrial design, manufacturing, materials, and physical products.