Staff at Osaka’s Expo 2025 Will Wear Air-Conditioned Jackets That Puff Up

Jackets with built-in rechargeable heaters are a trending way to stay warm during the cold winter months. As temperatures rise and clouds make way for clear skies and bright sunshine, hot/humid weather is a given. Clothing with built-in fans could make it big in offering you relief from the scorching heat. Japan-based Anrealage debuted this air conditioning fashion in its spring/summer 2025 collection at Paris Fashion Week. For practical use, the company has now incorporated fans in the staff uniform of the Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT) Pavilion.

The uniforms designed for the staff at NTT Pavilion Expo 2025 Osaka feature outerwear with built-in electric fans to help keep the wearer cool during warm weather. Placed on one side, the electric fan blows air when activated, causing the clothing to inflate and the wearer to resemble a cloud. “Drawn from the concept of parallel travel, the clothing uses wind to demonstrate the visual and feeling of traveling through time and space,” the company notes.

Designer: Anrealage

Piercing through the borders between fashion and technology, ace designer at Anrealage, Kunihiko Morinaga, breathes new fun into random clothing with the air from built-in fans. The spring/summer 2025 collection “Wind” sculpted new silhouettes, which are finding practical purpose in the NTT staff uniform that’s designed with hundreds of blue dots on a white base fabric. The display of color and dots, according to the company, is a “symbol of connecting with distant feeling.”

The uniform comprises five pieces a jacket, a polo shirt, a hat, a sling bag, and a logo badge. It’s actually the outerwear (jacket) that is embedded with electric fans for the staff the feel fresher working in warm conditions. The tiny, embedded fan resides in the lower section on the left side of the wearable. To ensure the spinning fan does not harm the wearer, its rotors reside within protective grilles.

The polo shirt and the outwear with built-in electric fan use Kyocera’s Forearth sustainable inkjet printing technology with water-free dying technique to achieve the desired dot patterns, Azek – breathable and quick drying fabric by Shikibo. The shirt made from this material is designed in such a way that it can fit anyone regardless of their body type. In addition to the polo shirt and the jacket, Anrealage has also made a bucket hat and a sling bag as part of the uniform. Both articles are made from chemically recycled yarn Muron fabric, which is made from 100 percent discarded fishing nets in Japan.

The logo badge to go with the trendy uniform is as peculiar as the other uniform articles. It is made from a photochromic fabric, which allows the badge to change color when indoors and outdoors, fancy right? While the use of the conceptual technology in staff uniform is an interesting application, I’m waiting for the day when my t-shirt has a built-in fan and I don’t look like a balloon wearing it!

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