Outdoor Voices | Technical Apparel for Recreation

In the first in our series exploring the designers behind the collections we meet Tyler Haney Creative Director and Founder of cult US active-ware label Outdoor Voices.

What inspired you to create Outdoor Voices?

The feeling of wanting to free fitness from performance. I'm from Boulder, Colorado, a small mountain city where activity is baked into everyday life, and I grew up playing sports and running track. When I was younger, trying to be the best and fastest made sense, but as soon as I graduated from school being active became more about moving my body for my mind and less about competition.

I started Outdoor Voices because I saw an opportunity to create a brand that flipped that idea of performance on its head and approached activity with moderation, and ease, and delight and something that looked aesthetically more in line with that I was wearing in my everyday life. The fabric is key to your products, how did you develop it? While I was studying at Parsons, I became obsessed with technical fabrics and the way material interacts with the body during different stages of sweat. I started spending time at the mills that were producing fabrics for the big guys in the activewear space, and worked with them to create OV Textured Compression, which is the foundation for a lot of the collection. I wanted to move away from that shiny black spandex look and create something that is flattering, has texture, and hides sweat. We continue to focus firstly on material innovation with both natural and synthetic yarns. We want people to feel a sense of discovery when they first touch our materials. Unexpected, new and novel. In the US you organise Outdoor Voices Jogger's Club or workout happy hour, do you have plans to the same in the UK or Europe? I was just in London for the first time for Wimbledon and I'm am absolutely coming back (with my jogging shoes!) Community is super important to us, and doing things is much more fun with friends. We think about retail more as a hub to bring people together around activity rather than a sales channel, so as OV keeps growing, we'™d love to be able to host events abroad in the same way we do in the U.S. get people together, sweat a little, have a beer, and keep it fun. Can you step us through a day in the life of Tyler Haney

Dog walk first thing with my pup, Tony. Then to the office, I spend the first part of my day with the product team, working with the designers on colours, concepts, new materials, but I bounce around from department to department and try to spend an hour or two in our Soho shop too, so I'™m on-the-go all day. Something we say a lot internally is, œChange the chemistry. If we're stuck on a problem or feeling a little tired, we organise a little activity to move things around, like our weekly OV Dribble Dribble pickup game during lunch I've got a pretty good jump shot.

How would you describe Couverture and The Garbstore? Couverture and The Garbstore is a fantastic, major part of OV history; it was THE first place to carry us. I can still see Ian Paley walking up to our booth and showing the first signs of excitement I was so nervous. :) In the early days, I threw aside the idea that activewear could only be carried in running shops and wanted to see OV alongside all the other brands I was wearing like APC. It's cool to see it all come together.

Outdoor Voices AW16 collection launching 19.07.16

We'll be live streaming the launch event. Visit us at Facebook/188couverture 19.07.16 10am GMT