TEXTILE MOTORCYCLE JACKETS

The fifth in our Silodrome Selection series, a weekly round-up curated by Silodrome editor James McBride.

There are many upsides to living in warmer climates. You get the sunshine, the barbecues and 365 days of riding weather each year. But there’s a downside to this toasty hedonism: it’s often too hot to wear full protective gear. Many people ride in a T-shirt and a 3/4 helmet as opposed to an armoured leather jacket, in which they’d likely overheat and pass out on the highway.

I currently live in Hong Kong, a sub-tropical city on the western shores of the Pacific Ocean. Summer temperatures regularly surpass 104 °F (39 °C), with humidity hovering between 99% and 100% for months on end. It would be a feat of superhuman endurance to wear full protective leathers in temperatures like this, and there are plenty of stories of new motorcyclists getting carted off to hospital in the back of a taxi after passing out from heatstroke, simply because they spent an hour sweltering in stationary traffic.

But there’s good news for those of us who live in places with summers like the 9th circle of Hades: There are now some genuinely fantastic textile motorcycle jackets out there. Designed specifically for warmer weather, they’ll reduce the chances of you turning into a squidgy lump of sweat on two wheels.