A good puffer coat is like a good piece of armor: reliable, resilient, resistant to sudden shocks and attacks (of rain, snow, sleet, wind and other weather-related terrors).
But the best puffer is easy, rich and impossibly elegant, too.
Or maybe we should say the best puffers, plural.
That’s because Max Mara — the storied coat maker behind the oversized, double-breasted and iconic 101801 style and the adorable Teddy Bear Icon coat that Taylor Swift wore to her appearance on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” this week — makes a few dozen variations of these winter wonders.
They’re part of the brand’s The Cube collection: an integrated system of outerwear and accessories centered around the perfect padded jacket.
Max Mara launched The Cube in 2008 as a way to showcase its latest material and design innovations. Many of its pieces are reversible, customizable and optimal for layering with one another. (An iridescent bronze quilted coat — stuffed with Siberian goose feathers and cinched at the waist with a belt — looks particularly chic under the company’s wool toppers.)
The collection now includes quietly luxurious camel bombers in “water-repellent taffeta,” a cropped black nylon swing jacket with ladylike bracelet sleeves and iridescent vests with detachable hoods. There’s even a thin nylon zip-up cardi with white trimming that looks like a rain-resistant Jackie O jacket.
Each piece of outerwear is modular, packable and comes in its own self-contained box.
A few years ago, Max Mara began pumping up some of its Cube items with a sustainable material called Cameluxe.
For more than seven decades, the company has used wool with fibers made from camel hair — obtained by the natural combing of these majestic creatures. In an effort to reduce waste, it began collecting the fabric left over after cutting its famed coats. These pieces are then processed into delicate fibers and mixed with recycled polyester. The end result is Cameluxe, and it’s not only eco-friendly but “highly insulating.”
Now that’s hot.
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