Gi Review: Oss Kimono v1.0B

Summary
A good, sturdy, smart and tastefully designed debut gi offering from Oss Clothing. The gi in size A1 fitted me very well and performed comfortably throughout training. Unusually shiny trousers as well!


Disclosures
I have been commissioned by Oss Clothing in the past on a freelance basis, I have had no input into this product.

Introduction
Oss Clothing have been operating for around a year. They started out with a range of attractive Japanese inspired t-shirts (including some that were designed by me) and have now moved on to their first gi uniform offering that they state has taken them 9 months to develop. Although a new company, the owner has been involved with BJJ for a long time (in 2006 he founded Purebred USA - Enson Inuoe's own clothing brand) so I would expect this to be a well developed product.




Size, Weight, Shrinkage and other stats:

A: 165 / 161
B: 73 / 73
C: 58 / 58
D: 17 / 16.5
E: 55 / 55
F: 97 / 95
G: 22.5 / 22

Weight
Jacket - 1.1kg
Trousers - 0.5kg
Price: $135
Available from: http://www.ossclothing.com/oss-kimono-version-1-black
More information: Facebook Page

My stats: Weight 58Kg, Height: 169cm

As the stats above display, shrinkage is virtually negligible on both the jacket and trousers. With a wingspan of 161cm, the A1 jacket is nice and long along the sleeve lengths, which suit me very well. The same can be said of the trousers, which at 95 centimetres in length, fit me perfectly. The stats are very similar to the Tatami Fightwear Estilo gi. The weight, at 1.7Kg is a little on the heavy side for the average A1 sized gi, but the fabric is 550gsm pearlweave cotton, so that is understandable. For reference, 550gsm is considered 'medium to slightly heavy weight, and something made from around 400-450gsm is often labelled as ultra light weight, although in practical terms, it's not a huge amount of difference when wearing such items.

Handily, the Oss website includes size data for sizes A1 to A4 as well (though users note some of the A1 data differs slightly to my own).


Jacket
The jacket is made from 550gsm pearlweave cotton. It features silvery grey contrast stitching and embroidery throughout.

The collar is quite thick and  'spongey' in fee. It is covered with twill cotton that feels noticeably soft and smooth.

The embroidered kanji pops out against the black colour gi fabric.

The sleeve cuffs are lined with soft twill cotton tape and triple stitched for reinforcement.

The side vents are reinforced with a triangle of fabric ad lined with contrast twill covering.

The word 'persevere' in a cursive font is embroidered straight on to the right side of the jacket - though this will be obscured when the left flap is wrapped over and the belt tightened.

There does not appear to be any under armpit reinforcements.

Trousers
The trousers are made from twill cotton and feature a pearlweave gusset panel. The trousers are very shiny for some reason. The double knee layer is woefully short, barely covering the knee caps when kneeling.

The rope drawstring is not stretchy but seems to do the job of remaining tied more than adequately. A total of six belt loops keep the rope in place.

Gusset panel, being made from pearlweave fabric is nice and strong. This is reinforced with triangular patches of extra fabric.

Trousers ankle seams are triple stitched and twill tape.



Rolling Performance and Conclusions

I have to say I really liked rolling in this gi. It fitted me very well for sleeve and trouser length and the colourway is tastefully applied. The use of super shiny and very soft twill for the collar covering and the trousers results in a very comfortable wearing gi. Shrinkage is negligible too. Minor niggles would perhaps be that the gi skirt is a tad long and the jacket width is a tad too wide for me (you can see that I had to bunch it up a bit in the photos above) and the knee pads are too small to be of any use, but apart from that, there is very little to criticise here. Overall it's a great debut gi from Oss Clothing and is a gi I will be happy to add to my rotation.


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