We love sweatshirts–not just as graphic vehicles, but for the truly functional and stylistic place they occupy in American culture. In terms of material, we tend to prefer super-traditional, heavyweight reverse weaves, like the ones created decades ago by Champion. Designed to last and minimize shrinkage, they were a technological breakthrough then, and their quality remains relevant today. However, we recognize that sweatshirts serve many purposes, and don't all need to be heavyweight.
Our Lightweight Sweats are designed to do two things: first, we wanted them to be more useful as we moved further into spring and summer (when the weather isn't exactly freezing, but still calls for a bit more coverage on chilly days or nights); second, we wanted to challenge ourselves to be able to offer them for a better price. A few things impact this–the quality and weight of the cloth itself, the type of sewing, the quantity, and the place of manufacture. We didn't want to skimp on quality, but realized a lighter version could be slightly less expensive while giving us the spring/summer weight we were looking for.
So we made these in the same place as our Heavyweight Fleece, meaning the attention to great materials and knitting is the same. While they're still reverse-weave, our Lightweight Sweats are constructed more simply, with less exterior stitching. This not only brought down their price, but seemed more appropriate for warmer weather. Too much construction actually looked strange, in our opinion, for the purpose we were after.
The end result is a high-quality, lighter-weight sweat at a better price.
