Free Shipping on Orders Over $99 Earth Is Now Our Only Shareholder
Free Shipping on Orders Over $99
Orders are shipped within 1-2 business days and arrive within 3-10 business days. Need it sooner? Concerned about the environmental impact? Flexible shipping options are available.
If we have any hope of a thriving planet—much less a business—it is going to take all of us doing what we can with the resources we have. This is what we can do.
When it comes to fleece, we love to talk trash. Recycled soda bottles, unusable manufacturing waste and worn-out garments (including our own) are used here and there to create our fleece vests, fleece pullovers and full-zip fleece jackets. Using recycled materials for what some call our “fuzzy jacket” styles lessens our dependence on petroleum as a source of raw materials. But using recycled materials wasn’t always the way we made our beloved fluffy fleece—whether it’s for women, men, babies or kids.
The Story of Fleece
ABack in the early 1980s, Patagonia partnered with Massachusetts-based fabric maker Malden Mills to create the first light, strong pile fabric out of virgin polyester, which we then used to make our very first men’s fleece pullovers and women’s fleece pullovers. Soon after, the world fell in love with fleece. Before long, every outdoor brand started making things out of this versatile new fabric—from fleece sweatpants to fleece headbands to technical fleece. Colorful fleece provided nearly all the benefits of wool, was easy to wash and could be layered over or under virtually anything.
Colorful Fleece: The Move to Recycled Fleece
Polyester fleece is a petroleum-based fiber and we wanted to limit our use of fossil-fuel based materials in our line. We worked with our mill partners such as Polartec (hence the name polar fleece), formerly Malden Mills, to create recycled fleece. By 1993, we were the first outdoor clothing manufacturer to transform trash into fleece. Our first recycled polyester fleece was the color of the plastic bottles it was made from: soda-bottle green.
Wool and Polyester Blend Men’s Quarter-Zip Fleece?
Our fleece today has come full circle. We started our journey to polyester fleece by trying to find a warmer, more breathable alternative to a favorite wool sweater our founder, Yvon Chouinard, loved. Yes, polyester fleece has some advantages over wool, but wool isn’t a petroleum-based fiber, and we like that. And recycled wool is better yet. Blending recycled wool into, say, our quarter-zip fleece pullover styles allows us to emit less carbon than we would using virgin polyester. It also helps us divert quite a lot of clothing from landfills. If you’re looking for the perfect fleece, we haven’t made it yet. We’re still tinkering.
When you visit our website, we store cookies on your browser to collect information. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences or your device, and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to and to provide a more personalized web experience. However, you can choose not to allow certain types of cookies, which may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings according to your preference. You cannot opt-out of our First Party Strictly Necessary Cookies as they are deployed in order to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting the cookie banner and remembering your settings, to log into your account, to redirect you when you log out, etc.). For more information about the First and Third Party Cookies used please follow this link.
More information
Manage Consent Preferences
Strictly Necessary Cookies
Always Active
These cookies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched off in our systems. They are usually only set in response to actions made by you which amount to a request for services, such as setting your privacy preferences, logging in or filling in forms. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not then work. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable information.
Sale or Share of Personal Data
Under the California Consumer Privacy Act, you have the right to opt-out of the sale of your personal information to third parties. These cookies collect information for analytics and to personalize your experience with targeted ads. You may exercise your right to opt out of the sale of personal information by using this toggle switch.
If you opt out we will not be able to offer you personalised ads and will not hand over your personal information to any third parties. Additionally, you may contact our legal department for further clarification about your rights as a California consumer by using this Exercise My Rights link. If you have enabled privacy controls on your browser (such as a plugin), we have to take that as a valid request to opt-out. Therefore we would not be able to track your activity through the web. This may affect our ability to personalize ads according to your preferences.
Social Media & Advertising Cookies
These cookies are set by a range of social media services that we have added to the site to enable you to share our content with your friends and networks. They are capable of tracking your browser across other sites and building up a profile of your interests. This may impact the content and messages you see on other websites you visit. If you do not allow these cookies you may not be able to use or see these sharing tools.
Analytical & Performance Cookies
Our analytics cookies are mainly placed by third parties such as e.g. Google Analytics & Adobe Analytics. Analytics cookies are placed on the basis of your consent. You may withdraw your consent at any time. These cookies allow us to count visits and traffic sources so we can measure and improve the performance of our site. They help us to understand which pages are the most and least popular and see how visitors move around the site. In addition, these cookies collect unique identifiers, such as the unique visitor ID assigned to your device when you visit our websites. Such unique identifiers cannot be read by third parties. By analysing your behaviour in response to our marketing statements and websites, we can better tailor our website and offers to your personal preferences. If you do not allow these cookies we will not know when you have visited our site, and will not be able to monitor its performance. If you are using Google Chrome, you can also install the Google browser extension that provides an opt-out for Google Analytics cookies.
Targeting Cookies
These cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.
