In Search of the Perfect Cloak

It's that blessed time of year again. It's time for a new Assassin's Creed game! And for us that means it's time to re-imagine those assassins in a new light...VIKINGS!

We did a ton of research. We looked at different braiding designs, hairstyles that were popular, shields, colors that fabric would have been available in, and then we went to work to design a belt, wraps and a cloak. We opted for a more natural jute coloring for the wraps and belt. Oilcloth would have been very common, and would make gear more rugged, so we introduced that into the belt. Instead of making one big ol' coat, we decided to make a set of things that could get styled with just about anything else you already own.

The cloak is obviously a staple of Viking life. We made 4 different cloaks before we settled on this one. The first one was wool and while gorgeous, it weighed a ton! It was also so expensive to make that we decided to bail on it for our first cloak. Like do people even want cloaks? We like them sure, but maybe we're alone in our desire to swoop around. But if this cloak goes well, we can re-visit the wool idea! It was also HOT(yes, in both ways).

The second version we made came out a bit vampirey. It was super spikey, it was very cool, and black and red. We've got that one in our back pocket for another time. (We haven't gotten the vampire edition of Vikings yet, but man that would be unbelievable! I am a bit of on old horror addict.)

The third cloak was pretty close. We sent this one to Ubisoft to have a look. They liked it, but let us know the colors were a bit too Arno. So, we did a 4th version.

The fourth one was what you see as the long version, but when we put it on our shorter colleagues, we saw quickly that we needed another size. Thus, the final version comes in two sizes to accommodate more heights.

My very favorite element of this cloak (besides the amazing swoopability) is the triple V shapes. The hood when it's down forms a V on the back center panel—which is a V shape—and the back point is, you guessed it, a V point. The symmetry and repeated shapes are ittttt. I bet you could find a V shape in everything we've ever designed. A challenge?