The Smart Revolution will stop at nothing, we suppose, and we’ve now seen our first Smart Jacket – the Levi’s Commuter Trucker Jacket, a collaboration between Google and Levi’s to bring technology to a totally classic piece of outerwear. Cut exactly like your typical denim jacket, the Commuter Jacket is made with Jacquard by Google fabric, which has touch and gesture controls woven right into the sleeve. This lets you control your paired phone just by brushing or tapping the sleeve; you can control music, navigation, receive calls, etc – all the usual smart device tasks. You can even ask your jacket to give an ETA to your destination – a nice tool for commuters. The Jacquard app lets you customize exactly what each gesture controls to your liking.
In addition to its handy tech functions, the Commuter Jacket is a highly modern, functional piece. It’s made with 4-way stretch and articulated shoulders for increased mobility, a lower back hem, 3M reflective tape to keep you safe off on the road, and zip pockets. You can even wash it – but only up to 10 times before the Jacquard technology stops working. That may not seem like much, but seeing how little you’re really supposed to wash denim – especially jackets, which are only supposed to be cleaned when particularly dirty – you should have plenty of life in this jacket. The style itself will probably always be in style.
The real question is, is it worth the $350 price tag? To be honest, the smart technology in this jacket doesn’t seem like much more than a gimmick at this point – it doesn’t do anything your headphones or smartwatch don’t, except drive up the price of a nice-but-otherwise-simple denim jacket. But if you’re the kind of person who wants a smart jacket, you probably don’t care too much about that price point. It goes up for sale October 2nd.
