There are few items of clothing as politically, socially and racially charged as the hoodie. Long a linchpin of streetwear and, more recently, the advertising campaigns and catwalks of high fashion, the hoodie is a contemporary wardrobe staple, a declaration of fealty to a school or team, a comfortable garment for a plane ride and a sight that can trigger fear and panic.

Desired and derided in equal measure, regularly misunderstood, the hoodie is now heavy with associations of social inequality, youth culture and police brutality, even banned from certain streets, schools and institutions worldwide.