The North Face Summit Series Futurefleece: first impressions
The North Face Summit Series Futurefleece hooded jacket is a super-lightweight and well-designed mid layer from the American outdoor powerhouse. Designed for mountaineers and lightweight backpackers, it’s billed as being able to ‘optimize body temperature’ thanks to ‘innovative technology’, and comes with a bunch of features that are set to improve your experience in the outdoors.
• List price: $170 (US) / £135 (UK)
• Weight: (Men’s medium) 7.34oz / 208g
• Sizes: S-XXL (men’s); XS-XXL (women’s)
• Fabric: 55% polyester, 45% recycled polyester
• Colors: Blue / Black / Meadow Grass / Green
That said, The North Face are also the stand-out leaders in the outdoors industry when it comes to marketing . So how good is this fleece jacket, really? Or is this just another product of fancy marketing?
To start with, it’s worth highlighting the jacket’s price. Coming in at $170 (US) / £135 (UK) when bought directly from The North Face, the Summit Series Futurefleece is certainly not for everybody. But for a mid layer of this type, I’d argue that it’s actually well-priced for what it is. Compare it with the Rab Ascendor or the Mountain Equipment Lumiko, for example, which are very similar jackets built for very similar escapades. Even though they might cost £25 and £55 less respectively, they both weigh around 100g more and don’t pack down as small as the Futurefleece. And when you compare it with the ever-popular Patagonia R1, which costs £5 more and weighs almost twice as much at 366 grams, the price tag suddenly becomes less shocking.
The North Face Summit Series Futurefleece: features
The Futurefleece comes with a tight-fitting hood ideal for wearing under a helmet and a raised neckline suitable for tucking your chin into to hide from biting wind. As this is so snug, I found that the hood also worked as a snood when not done up, working to keep your neck extra warm if you’re wearing this jacket in combination with a beanie or winter hat.
Additionally, the jacket also comes with thumb loops that are practically invisible when not being used. This is again something I particularly appreciated as I dislike the overly technical look of a pair of thumb holes. On this jacket, however, you get the best of both worlds: the ability to hold your sleeves in place when scrambling or climbing in a package that looks as good as it functions.
What’s more, the jacket comes with a large Napoleon pocket that’s easily big enough for an OS map, phone, charger or any other small object you need close at hand on your adventures.
Finally, the zips on The North Face Summit Series Futurefleece are of exceptional quality and impressively easy to use. They slide up and down without snagging on the material surrounding them and, thanks to the long toggles, are really easy to use even when wearing thick winter hiking gloves.
Meet the reviewer
The North Face Summit Series Futurefleece: fit
The fit of the North Face Summit Series Futurefleece is best described as athletic. I loved it: It’s tight enough around the shoulders and the arms that it doesn’t rub or move when worn as a mid layer, but it’s not so tight that I feel self-conscious wearing it as an outer layer, too. My only gripe, in fact, is that the jacket feels quite long; longer than the Patagonia Triolet waterproof shell I paired this with. Therefore, when I needed to tighten everything up in a rain storm, I found that I had to pull up the bottom of the fleece slightly to tuck it under the waist cord of the jacket.
The North Face Summit Series Futurefleece: in the wild
I first got my hands on The North Face Summit Series Futurefleece hooded jacket at the start of September. Since then, I’ve worn it as a breathable outer layer on a warm wander in Bannau Brycheiniog (née, the Brecon Beacons) and as a mid layer on a handful of chilly camps. I wore it several times inside a sleeping bag on nights when I should have opted for something thicker, and I wore it on half a dozen hikes through the Utah backcountry where the temperature ranged from near-freezing to well over 70°F / 21°C. I’ve got it wet, put it up against the wind and sweated right through it on a mid-fall fastpacking trip. So I think it’s fair to say that I’m confident in my assessment of it.
Super-thin and tiny to pack away, the first thing I particularly enjoyed about this fleece is just how small and easy it is to take with you on practically any trip. Even on trail runs where I was taking a tiny pack, I was able to squash this jacket up so small that I never needed to leave it at home. Oh, and as it weighs about the same as a tube of toothpaste, so I barely noticed it was in there. In fact, in all my years of testing, the North Face Summit Series Futurefleece jacket is the lightest fleece I’ve ever had the pleasure of trying.
Regarding its performance, the Futurefleece also punches way above its weight. Even when setting up camp in temperatures of around 45°F / 7°C, I was more than comfortable in this when wearing nothing but a 260 ZoneKnit Long Sleeve Half Zip Thermal Top base layer from Icebreaker underneath it. Granted, the moment I stopped moving I got a little chilly, but this thing does a great job of boosting your warmth.
Built for mountaineering trips, it truly excels at high-intensity activity. And while I haven’t actually tested it on any high-alpine trips, I have run at least 50 miles in this jacket, and the breathability is nothing short of exceptional. Additionally, being made solely out of polyester, it dries out very quickly and keeps you warm long into the night – even after you’ve been sweating in it all day.
For a fleece this thin and light, the North Face Summit Series Futurefleece is also decent in the wind. Don’t take that to mean that it will keep you warm on a blowy summit – it won’t! – but it does a decent job at making sure you don’t immediately start shivering the minute you pop out into the wind when scrambling up a mountainside.
The North Face Summit Series Futurefleece: the bottom line
Overall, I love this mid layer. Initially, I thought no polyester fleece could ever convince me it was worth $170 / £135, but the more I wore this, the more I warmed up to the cost.
It’s versatile, comfortable and great to look at, meaning you could comfortably wear it to the office as well as out on the hill – and comes with a series of well-designed features that are a true joy to use. Being as good on a run as it is on a hike or bike ride, the Summit Series Futurefleece from The North Face may actually be the top I’d choose if I had to pick one layer for all sports for the rest of my life. Which, when you think about it, suddenly makes that seemingly pricey outlay seem reasonable.
