Technology

Wet clothing transmits body heat nearly twenty-five times faster than dry. All clothing with this symbol is guaranteed to be totally waterproof. And highly breathable membrane technology means that you won’t get wet from inside either.

Cutting down windchill can make more difference to your comfort and safety than the amount of insulation you are wearing. We offer two ratings according to use: Windproof and Highly Wind Resistant.

Keeping comfortable in the heat can be harder than keeping warm in the cold. Comfort strategies are limited. We choose the right weight of fabrics, employ Airflow™ weaves and use Dynamic Moisture Control™ technology.

We use man-made technical insulation that offers high levels of thermal efficiency, quick dry times and minimum bulk. We also use the finest goose down for the coldest environments. All materials for cold weather, that carry the warmth icon, are rated Base, Mid, High or Extreme allowing you to select what you need with accuracy.

We pioneered the testing of fabric for UV penetration in the UK over fifteen years ago. The health risks are now, of course, more widely recognised. All Rohan fabrics for hot weather, that carry the sun icon, are tested for their Ultraviolet Protection Factor and rated either High (20+) or Total (40+).

We were the original lightweight revolutionaries. Back in the 1970’s we realised that cutting weight without losing performance meant that you can take less and do more. All our clothing is engineered to achieve this. The weight is shown against each garment.

Low pack size is a benefit whether you’re packing for a day’s walking or for the trip of a lifetime. We continually scrutinise fabric specification and garment construction to minimise the packed size of our clothing. The actual pack size is tested and listed.

All Rohan clothing is designed to be very fast drying – as much a benefit for unexpected downpours as anything else. It’s easy to wash and often needs no ironing. Almost all garments will dry overnight, meaning you can take less with you. We test every item and list its drying time.

Conventional waterproof fabrics cannot adapt to the changing weather outside and the changing micro-climate inside. Barricade™ is different, it is dynamic and responds to your body temperature and the humidity of the surrounding environment. The sweatier and steamier things get inside, the better the membrane works and the more vapour escapes.

With a better warmth to weight ratio than fleece and far better performance when wet than down, Insuloft™ is the most practical and thermally efficient insulator available. It is an advanced synthetic that is tough, lightweight, packable, fast drying and easy to wash.

Tiny traces of silver are distributed evenly throughout the fibres of a garment. These inhibit the development of microbes that can grow exponentially in warm and damp areas, resulting in mould and odour. It is permanent, it will not wash out or wear out.

Our new BiteGuard™ fabric treatment is now more durable, and remains fully effective after at least 70 washes. Tests have shown that that it reduces mosquito bites by 97%. It is an odorless, water-based and biodegradable compound that is friendly to your skin. The active ingredient within BiteGuard™ is recommended by the World Health Organisation for use on clothing to protect individuals from biting insects.

Our Dynamic Moisture Control™ finish is a permanent, wicking treatment that rapidly spreads moisture, such as sweat, over a wide surface area of the fabric. This ensures the garment dries more quickly and you stay more comfortable - even in the hottest and most humid conditions.

Staying cool in the heat is actually more challenging than keeping warm in the cold. The most effective fabric technology is to use open weave structures that disperse heat through convective cooling.

All Rohan garments use 800+ fill power goose down – a standard that represents the very best that is practically available. We use the European measurement system; if we used the North American system, we would expect a rating of at least 850.

Rohan’s flagship water resistant finish technology will withstand no less than fifty
washeswithout any loss of performance. And after fifty washes it still operates at 80%
effectiveness.

Even though this is our most basic level of water resistant finish, it far exceeds what is acceptable to most of our big name competitors. It will withstand at least twenty washes. And at this point, its performance will still remain at 80% efficiency.

Another first for Rohan. Unique Coolant™ technology works by embedding microscopic mica crystals into the knit of the fabric. This has an active, cooling effect on the body. Tests show that the temperature within the garment is two degrees lower than in normal, untreated clothing. In terms of comfort this is massive. In the search for new tactics to solve the age old problem of how to keep cooler in hot weather Coolant™ represents a real breakthrough and a significant step forward.

Pocket science at Rohan is all about precision and detail of design, but most of all, it’s about keeping your most important stuff safe at times when losing keys, passports and wallet is more than just an inconvenience. We use several different methods – whichever is the most appropriate. Some pockets are completely hidden with micro zips, some are touch and close with roll-over tops and some are high quality zips.

Building stretch into our fabrics offers some big advantages. It allows us to make very comfortable, streamlined clothing. And a close fit has big advantages for active people. Clothes don’t flap in the wind, they work well in a layering system without bulking up and because there is less fabric, they are lighter, dry quicker and pack smaller – all critical Rohan virtues.

Good design is more often about what to take off than what to put on. And clever design is about giving one feature two functions, that’s why many Rohan garments feature an internal mesh stretch pocket that doubles as a Packpocket™ for easy storage.

For maximum performance with minimum palaver, zip one of our Interchange™ mid-layers into a matching shell. It makes a full-on, lined winter jacket without the fuss of lots of layers and too many pockets. Carefully designed attachment points at the collar and cuffs as well as the main internal zips make for a perfect fit. And of course you get the flexibility to convert the double jacket back to two whenever you feel like it.

By painstakingly stripping out unnecessary fabric and avoiding the common practice of double fabric panels we gain many advantages. The clothing is lighter and less bulky as well as quicker drying and more breathable. And because our fabrics are super tough, functionality can be improved by stripping away anything that doesn’t really need to be there.

Some of our garments have a split personality and are built with two distinct levels of performance. This is accessed simply by turning them inside out. You get two garments in one saving weight and pack space. A typical example of this is where we have designed one side of the garment to protect against windchill and one side to offer warmth.