The Irish Defence Forces are focussed on accommodating needs of all wearers to ensure more women can be recruited and retained within their services, throughout their working careers, whilst at the same time improving the standard of their uniforms for the benefit of all wearers.
Workwear Solutions International was asked to advise the Irish Defence Forces to update and redevelop the Naval Service disruptive pattern material (DPM) range to better accommodate the needs of all wearers to support this objective.
The existing Naval Service DPM range had been in place for several years, during which time a number of improvement areas had been identified, including the fabrics being used for the camouflage print, the quality of the base layer t-shirts and the sizing as this had historically been a unisex range with a slim fit shirt/lightweight jacket introduced as more of a feminine fit which could be worn by male or female naval service personnel.
The products are used on-board naval service ships and therefore require special fabrics and design features which safely enable the wearer to be able to respond to any small fires which may break out below deck. This means the range covers from the neck to the ankles and wrists, and from the skin outwards.
Working closely with feedback from the wider wearer group and the clothing procurement office, specifications were developed with full details and specific requirement relating to test reports for fabrics and trims. These addressed and focussed on key durability aspects such as colourfastness and tensile strength for the main fabrics, and also for whole of garment testing for stretch and recovery for the t-shirts to improve on the previous garments.
Key to the importance and success of this range is the Introduction of female fit garments – this is the first roll out of a full female specific operational clothing system for the Irish Defence Forces.
Female fit trousers, t-shirts and shirts/light weight jackets were developed and prototyped during the tender process – this was an efficient method of testing the fit / form of the garments before awarding the contract and effectively used samples which were going to be produced anyway to fast-track the process without excessive additional sampling.
Development of the size charts was important to make sure that the layers integrated properly and could be worn in conjunction with one another. Key to FR protection is thermal barriers which are created by air gaps in between layers of clothing and the fit should be worn close to the body but with sufficient space to create airflow to support the thermal barriers. Therefore, for example, when designing the new female fit products, it was key that the t-shirts could be worn underneath the lightweight shirts without bunching (e.g. in the underarms) or being too close to the body, but also not creating snag risks by being too baggy.
Maternity wear was also included within the project, including t-shirts, trousers and shirts/lightweight jackets in FR fabrics, and a smock / overcoat in a non-FR fabric (for use only in specific areas where FR is not a requirement).
The introduction of a full range of female fit items and complementary maternity range make this a truly inclusive uniform, in a sector and environment which has relatively low female workforces and therefore the tendency is towards unisex items which don’t necessarily take into consideration different morphologies.