It’s 2003, you’re in your room instant messaging your crush, Tell All Your Friends is blasting from your Sony Psyc boombox—and you’re wearing a zip-up hoodie. You weren’t the only one, either: from gym classes to red carpets, zip-up hoodies were everywhere throughout the 2000s, popularized by peak indie sleaze (and sometimes, just plain sleazy) brands like American Apparel. Then something changed, society and the fashion powers that be reevaluated their opinion on the matter, and suddenly, the zip-up ceded its dominance to the almighty pullover. Band tees as virtue signals became a strictly warm weather swerve. Easy donning and doffing with the flick of a zipper? No longer. For much of the 2010s, the pullover hoodie—buoyed by a streetwear boom that encouraged emerging brands to slap their graphics on some beefy fleece—reigned supreme. But with the hallmarks of Y2K style on the upswing, zip-up hoodies are once again flooding the market.
Think of the zip-up as the pullover’s edgy young brother, but with way more layering potential. In its most natural state, it can cuddle-up to a matching set of pants and a baggy tee with flair. (Top it off with a swanky necklace, crisp sneakers, and some stellar shades and you’re left with a fit on par with Shai Gilgeous-Alexander at his tunnel-trotting best.) Unzipped and left open, it can also take on the role of a picture frame ready to display your sickest graphic tee—much like the cardigan, another treasure of 2000s fashion. Or make like a mid-aughts garage band ironically donning corporate attire and wear your zip-up over a dress shirt and baggy tailored trousers, a high-minded fashion move with a jolt of kooky Scandinavian cool.
If you had the foresight to save your zip-up hoodies from high school, it’s time to crack open the attic and dust them off. But for those of us whose zip-ups were lost to time (or are too young to remember when Transatlanticism first dropped), we rounded up 17 pitch-perfect options you can buy right now.
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