Air-conditioned dress shirts arrive in Japan to save working professionals from sweltering heat

These dress shirts are sure to have fans.

If you need business attire in Japan, Yofuku no Aoyama is pretty much always a safe choice. They may not have the trendiest fashions from brand-name designers, but they can set you up with outfits appropriately dressy for a day in the office or a meeting with clients, and at affordable prices too.

For example, here’s one of their new button-up shirts. Nothing flashy or overly fancy, but a respectable, understated summer business look.

Now, looking at that photo, you might get the impression that the person wearing it is a little on the stocky side. However, the puffiness of the shirt isn’t a result of overindulgence in edible fireworks sweets, taco sweets, or convenience store-flavor fried chicken. It’s actually because this isn’t just a dress shirt, it’s also a wearable cooling system, and its fans are engaged in the image above.

Look closely, and you’ll see that there’s actually a fan positioned inside the shirt, near the small of the back. Actually, there are two fans, one on each side, and when switched on they provide blasts of cool air, directed inwards to cool down the wearer and help them deal with the summer heat.

Air-conditioned garments like this have become more popular in Japan in recent years, but mainly as an extension of equipment for workers in fields such as construction, garbage disposal, and event crowd control. As such, they’ve usually looked like blue-collar uniform vests or jackets, more “gear” than “apparel.” But with summers in Japan getting hotter and hotter, more and more people have been showing an interest in cooled garments, and Yofuku no Aoyama has responded with its new shirts, developed in partnership with fan-equipped fashion maker FZN to create an option for business settings.

Though the fan is noticeable from behind, the designers have done a pretty impressive job concealing it from other angles.

Yofuku no Aoyama says extensive efforts were made to keep the system’s weight down to…