A woman’s video has gone viral on social media according to which we would wear clothes the wrong way hoods with fur typical of many winter jackets, supporting the edge with fur it should be folded inside of the hood itself in order to keep the head warmer. In the comments sections, a heated debate broke out between supporters and opponents of this theory. But what does science say about it? Actually the fur on the outside has a very useful function, i.e protect your facenot only from the cold but also from the wind and humidity.
Let’s first make a sacrosanct premise: hoods with fur also have a aesthetic functionthat is, those who like this style and prefer the hood of their jacket to have visible fur regardless of thermal insulation issues are not using the hood in the wrong way. For example, those who like to wear caps with the visor backwards do so for reasons stylistic and socio-cultural which have nothing to do with the practical objective of a visor, that is, to shield the sunlight from the eyes. Maybe for some people the hair in direct contact with the head can be a nuisance or ruin hairstyles and hairstyles.
But let’s move on to the technical issues. Let’s start from a very simple consideration: even if there is a “right way” to wear the fur of a hood, if that “right way” was inside the hood itself, jacket manufacturers would make the hoods like this. As in all things, it all depends on the purpose that you want to achieve. The Inuitfor example, have been using the hood with fur on the outer edge for millennia and hardly anyone would think that all this time they have been wrong about something so crucial to them.
The fact is that the fur on the outside has a very specific function, i.e make the cold more bearable for your facewhich is the only part of the head not covered by the hood. Furs – natural or synthetic – are in fact excellent thermal insulators because they “trap” small pockets of air inside the structure, effectively creating a sort of “microclimate” which drastically reduces heat dispersion. In short, the fur on the hood keeps the air around the face a little warmer than the surrounding air, and this helps us feel less cold on the face.
Then there is the fact that the hair mechanically repairs the face from wind, rain And snowsaving us numerous hassles when the weather is not exactly the best. Finally, the hairs shield from the humidity of the air, which tends to aggregate in small droplets around the thin and elongated structure of the hairs. The more “wet” the hair gets, the less moisture we end up on our face.
In short, folding the fur of the hood backwards certainly helps the head to warm up, but to the detriment of the comfort of the face, which is the main objective of the fur. If nothing else, the viral video made a lot of people discover it that this “configuration” also exists for your hood, which you can choose whether to adopt or not depending on the situation.
