It was just last year that we heard about Vollebak’s Black Light Jacket, which incorporates a series of black spots that reflect white in bright light. The company’s new Black Squid Jacket takes things several steps further, as the whole thing reflects in a rainbow of colors.
Inspired by the squid’s ability to rapidly change color, the polyester ski and snowboard garment’s surface is covered in a resin which in turn contains over 2 billion laser-embedded black glass microspheres. There are approximately 40,000 of the things per square centimeter of material.
In indoor or dull outdoor lighting conditions, the light reflects off the exterior of those spheres, causing the jacket to have a black, “oily” appearance – see the photo below. Bright sunlight (or even light from car headlights), however, travels through the curved surface of each microsphere and is reflected/scattered back out by an iridescent coating on the rear of that sphere.
As a result, the jacket reflects every colour in the visible spectrum. The color pattern shifts as the wearer moves, and it looks different depending on the angle from which it’s being viewed.
Along with its neat color-changing trick, some of the jacket’s other features include full waterproofing and windproofing, a Merino wool lining on the collar, zippered armpit vents, an internal zipped phone pocket with headphone loops, and Velcro-equipped adjustable-size cuffs.
The Vollebak Black Squid Jacket was officially launched this Wednesday, and can be purchased via the link below for US$995.