Polyester (elastane, etc.) clothes are much more common these days. Back in the 80s, people wore way more cotton shirts to the gym. Nowadays, most people wear some sort of sweat-wicking heat-venting material. They’re also cheaper; Under Armour used to run about $50. Nowadays, UA shirts tend to run about 3⁄5 that.
Remember back when wool was only for itchy sweaters? Nowadays, merino wool, which is less itchy for most people, is used for shirts and undershirts and even socks and underpants. The great thing about wool shirts is that you can wear them for almost a week and they won’t stink; this isn’t something you can do with cotton and especially not polyester.
There are a lot more stretchy materials out there, as well as stretchy materials (polyester) woven into less-stretchy materials (cotton) to give the stiffer materials a bit more give. This makes slim-fitting clothing less restrictive, if nothing else.
There are nylon pants that don’t look out of place at the office. Outlier’s Futureworks pants made out of F.Cloth (click on “Fabric” on the tabs) are better than cotton chinos in at least some respects; you can spill coffee on them and likely all of it will bead up and just run off, not staining anything or even getting wet. (They’ll eventually wet out if you’re walking around in the rain, though.)
While the price of insulation is a superlatively objective metric, it entirely misses advancements in anything other than insulation effectiveness. The big changes have all been in finding new points that balance the different tradeoffs between stretchiness/durability/stink trapping/cost/water resistance/stain resistance/warmth/air permeability.
Because evolution got sheep to produce wool that’s not made in a way that it’s easy for bacteria to infest. On the other hand cotton + sweat is a combination that gets bacteria to grow fast.
Cotton is simply a crappy but cheap material for making clothes.
Subjective experience:
Polyester (elastane, etc.) clothes are much more common these days. Back in the 80s, people wore way more cotton shirts to the gym. Nowadays, most people wear some sort of sweat-wicking heat-venting material. They’re also cheaper; Under Armour used to run about $50. Nowadays, UA shirts tend to run about 3⁄5 that.
Remember back when wool was only for itchy sweaters? Nowadays, merino wool, which is less itchy for most people, is used for shirts and undershirts and even socks and underpants. The great thing about wool shirts is that you can wear them for almost a week and they won’t stink; this isn’t something you can do with cotton and especially not polyester.
There are a lot more stretchy materials out there, as well as stretchy materials (polyester) woven into less-stretchy materials (cotton) to give the stiffer materials a bit more give. This makes slim-fitting clothing less restrictive, if nothing else.
There are nylon pants that don’t look out of place at the office. Outlier’s Futureworks pants made out of F.Cloth (click on “Fabric” on the tabs) are better than cotton chinos in at least some respects; you can spill coffee on them and likely all of it will bead up and just run off, not staining anything or even getting wet. (They’ll eventually wet out if you’re walking around in the rain, though.)
You can car camp in the rain, forget your rain gear, and everything’ll turn out mostly OK.
While the price of insulation is a superlatively objective metric, it entirely misses advancements in anything other than insulation effectiveness. The big changes have all been in finding new points that balance the different tradeoffs between stretchiness/durability/stink trapping/cost/water resistance/stain resistance/warmth/air permeability.
Why is this? I’m perplexed at how long my wool socks last.
Because evolution got sheep to produce wool that’s not made in a way that it’s easy for bacteria to infest. On the other hand cotton + sweat is a combination that gets bacteria to grow fast.
Cotton is simply a crappy but cheap material for making clothes.