The classic North Face Denali gets a luxe Italian wool upgrade

Some clothes earn their reputation the hard way. Long before it became a staple of city pavements and pub gardens, The North Face’s Denali jacket was busy doing serious things in serious places. It formed part of TNF’s pioneering 1988 expedition system and was worn during the first free ascent of El Capitan’s Salathé Wall, a résumé most jackets would kill for.

Over time, the Denali became something else entirely. A symbol of how outdoor kit quietly infiltrated everyday style. Practical, recognisable, and unmistakably The North Face. You know it when you see it; chances are it's what most people are referring to when they say a "North Face fleece".

Now, the brand has taken that icon and made a quietly radical change. It’s removed the fleece.

The Casentino Wool Pack swaps Denali’s familiar polyester for Casentino wool, sourced from Tuscany and dating back nearly 500 years. Which is, historically speaking, quite funny. Modern fleece was invented to replace wool, not the other way around. Patagonia built its reputation doing exactly that. The North Face, meanwhile, has decided to reverse course, and to its credit, works.

Casentino wool is a beast of a fabric. Naturally warm, water-resistant and hard-wearing, with a distinctive curled texture that feels closer to the original Denali fleece than you might expect. It’s the kind of material that looks better the more you live in it, and feels refreshingly unfussy in a world obsessed with technical buzzwords.

The collection itself is pleasingly restrained. The star is the 1995 Denali Casentino jacket, priced at £450. It’s the jacket you already know, just elevated, same silhouette, modern construction, recycled nylon panels, but now wrapped in Italian heritage wool. This isn’t hiking gear so much as a proper winter layer that just happens to be capable on a trail.

The Verto Alpine GTX Casentino boots follow suit. Proper Vibram soles, GORE-TEX waterproofing, and Casentino wool lining the tongue and interior for extra warmth. These are serious boots, not fashion ones pretending to be.

Rounding things out is a Classic Casentino five-panel cap (£80).

Admittedly, it’s expensive. But this isn’t a standard TNF kit. This is a luxury Italian fabric applied to one of outdoorwear’s most recognisable designs, and that context matters.

In a market flooded with ever-new technical materials, it’s oddly refreshing to see a brand look backwards with purpose. Innovation doesn’t always mean inventing something new. Sometimes it means recognising what’s already stood the test of time.

The North Face Casentino Wool Pack is available online and in select UK stores.

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