BAM: Feel-Good Fitness Clothing
With so much time spent running around keeping fit, it's only natural one might take note of what clothes they exercise. For me it has always been about how bright and colourful the fitness clothes are (to keep my mood up and motivate me to workout), as well as the fit (with all the squats and lunges it's better the clothes stayed in place as well as provided freedom for the movement). Having learnt about BAM clothing I can now add 'fair trade' requirement to the fitness clothes.
A UK brand launched back in 2006, Bamboo Clothing prides itself in being socially and environmentally friendly. Organic, eco-friendly and very soft, BAM clothes are designed to ensure good climate control to keep one warm when it’s cold and cool when it’s warm; the fabric is also highly absorbent, pulling moisture away from the body to the surface to evaporate; it has antibacterial properties and due to its smooth microstructure ensures it is very soft and comfortable to wear.
To see if the brand delivers to these high expectations, I gave a go to three BAM clothing garments: Long Line Vest (£23), Women's Bamboo Enduro Keyhole Leggings (£30), and Women's Bamboo Enduro Hoody in Pale Grape colour (£60).
The BAM fitness clothing items are indeed very soft and comfortable to wear. The leggings provide great support, do not limit the movement and stay in place no matter how active you are. Also, they are opaque black (aka not see-through) and still keep the shape after a few washes which - taking into account how active one can be and therefore how many times the clothes go into the wash - is a very important quality.
The top and the hoody however had their faults. While being 5'11'' I appreciated the design of the top - which was long and could be worn day-to-day due to its neutral design and comfortable material. After the first wash however it lost its shape completely with one side of the top becoming shorter than the other one. As for the hoody, I ordered my size however the sleeves were short (you'd imagine a hoody with thumb loops would have longer sleeves anyway - it still didn't work for me though) it was generally quite tight. The good news however is that once you get your BAM clothes delivered to you, you can try them on at home and arrange an exchange for a different size if you need to.
There is more to Bamboo Clothing than the three items I have picked: have a look at women’s collection here and men’s collection is available here.
