Gloves

For many years, the standard for warm winter gloves was a leather glove or mitten with a wool liner.  If you needed extra warmth beyond that, some manufacturers added goose down to their gloves but that tended to be very expensive.  Synthetic winter glove materials have been around for a long time but until recently, they were not the best choice to keep your hands warm in harsh weather.  Today a multitude of high quality synthetic materials advertised under countless trademark and brand names are competing for your hard-earned money in the warm winter glove market.  In most cases these high tech materials are a better choice to keep your hands warm compared to the old standard of leather, wool and goose down.  Below are some of the more common warm winter glove materials, trade names and brand names and a brief explanation of what it means. 

Nylon: Nylon has been around for as long as any of us can remember.  Today we take it for granted but improvements in durability and technology have made it the default material for the outer shell of warm winter gloves.  One disadvantage it has is it tends to be very slippery when wet.  Many manufacturers today add leather or a rubber type material to the palm and fingers of nylon glove shells to make it easier to grip things without slipping. 

Thinsulate: Thinsulate is a trademark of 3M and has been around since the 1980s.  It was invented to compete directly with duck and goose down as an insulating material.  It is a dense polyester fiber material that has better insulation per thickness than duck down and, in addition, is more crush resistant and water resistant compared to down. 

Outlast: Outlast is a new high tech material and is a trademark of Outlast Technologies.  The technology was originally developed by NASA and is used to keep astronauts warm in space as well as explorers in the Antarctic.  It utilizes PCM technology (phase change material) to make a "smart" textile that stores heat in tiny phase change capsules and releases it to you later when you need it.  It interacts with your skin temperature to not only keep you warm but also to prevent overheating and sweating.  It is very new and you may not see much of it on the market yet but it will clearly be a major part of winter wear in the future. 

Polartec (polar fleece): Polartec is perhaps the biggest name out there at the moment when it comes to winter clothing insulation.  It is a polyester spun fiber material similar to Thinsulate and was developed at about the same time.  There are many variations and types of both Thinsulate and Polartec materials but generally, Thinsulate is considered to be denser and a little warmer per thickness.  Either is an excellent choice for insulation in a winter glove. 

Gore-Tex: Gore-Tex is a unique material that is totally waterproof and wind proof but at the same time can breath and allows water vapors to pass through.  The material has pores that are 20,000 times smaller than rain drops but at the same time 700 times larger than a molecule of water.  The last thing you want in a winter glove is for your hands to start sweating.  Gore-Tex will help keep your hands warm as well as dry.  It is often used as a liner to wick moisture away from your skin but is sometimes used as an outer shell material. 

Primaloft: Primaloft is a synthetic polyester similar to Thinsulate and Polartec.  Primaloft was developed in the 1980s for use by the US Army and is made by Albany International who hold many of the patents for polyester insulations.  It is generally considered better than competing brands but is also more expensive.