The sweatshirt, born in the 1920s in the USA, was initially conceived as practical athletic wear by Benjamin Russell Jr., a football player discontented with itchy wool jerseys. Its comfortable cotton fleece soon attracted non-athletes, escalating its popularity in American colleges.

This sweatshirt, made from mid-weight 10 oz. loopwheel knitted cotton, features a brushed loopback French terry, making it warmer and softer than its unbrushed counterpart. Loopwheel machines, which produce this tubular constructed fabric, are renowned for their slow knitting pace, producing only a single meter of fabric per hour. However, this low thread tension technique is what sets them apart from contemporary manufacturing methods and creates an exceptional and distinctive fabric. The resulting material is reminiscent of hand-woven textiles and possesses a unique stretchy quality and washed look, similar to old American sweatshirts that can only be reproduced on a loopwheel knitting machine. This loopwheel sweat is knitted in Wakayama, Japan, using extremely rare machines known in Japan as Tsuriami-ki, and requires rare skills and techniques, exclusively for The Real McCoy’s.

Unlike mass-produced sweatshirts, The Real McCoy’s use different yarns across the layers of the fabric to achieve optimal finish, density, and comfort. Like the best vintage sweatshirts, the gusset details featured here have been sewn in. While this is a time-consuming process, it adds a layer of reinforcement, prevents the neck from stretching, and acts similarly to a sweatband.