Hans Hess (inventor)

Hans Hess, 2014

Hans Hess (born April 26, 1932 in Oberdürnten ) is a Swiss inventor and pioneer in the field of modern sportswear.

Life

At the age of eight, Hans Hess moved with his family to Winterthur , where he spent his school days and finally completed an apprenticeship as a mechanic. Later he worked at the technical center of the canton of Zurich in Winterthur as a mechanic for process engineering in the chemistry department. In his house in Schottikon (Elsau municipality) he met his neighbor and diving pioneer Hannes Keller on the stairwell , who had his own company for the development of diving equipment. In 1964, Keller hired Hans Hess as a laboratory technician and mechanic for the hyperbaric chamber. When the two went on a skiing holiday together in Wengen, they attended the Lauberhorn race . There they noticed the fluttering clothes of the ski racers and they began to develop skin-tight, aerodynamic racing suits. In 1969 they founded the clothing brand Skin. In 1970 their ski racing suits were used for the first time in a competition at the World Ski Championships in Val Gardena and in 1972 the Swiss ski racers Marie-Theres Nadig and Bernhard Russi surprisingly won gold in the suits of the Swiss inventors at the Olympic Winter Games in Sapporo . In the same year, Skin became the official supplier of the Swiss national ski team. Hannes Keller left the business in 1974 and Skin AG was liquidated. Hans Hess founded Hess Sportengineering AG based in Aadorf and went on alone.

As early as the 1960s, the clothing developers had established contacts with the Japanese sportswear company Descente, which deepened over the years. In 1978 Descente hired Hans Hess exclusively as a researcher and developer. Descente became the official outfitter for Swiss ski racers and remains so today.

In the course of his career, Hans Hess developed clothing for 30 sports in his studio in Aadorf, Thurgau. He invented a completely new cut and drove the development of new yarns and fabrics. Especially in skiing and cycling, with ski jumpers and in motor sports, his inventions caused a stir and new regulations. The so-called "fish skin", a plasticized suit that was extremely streamlined, was heavily criticized. However, the smooth fabric did not slow down when the ski racers fell. In addition, the athletes sweated extremely in the airtight suits. That is why fish skin was banned by the Fédération Internationale de Ski in 1975 . She then stipulated a minimum air permeability that the racing suits must meet. In motorsport, Hess was one of the first to use extremely strong aramid fibers , known under the brand name Kevlar. The sidecar duo Kurt Waltisperg and Rolf Biland started in 1984 for the first time in a synthetic fiber combination.

In 1994 Hans Hess liquidated his Sportengineering AG and retired. He is married to Edith Hess and lives in Elgg.

literature

• The medal cutter. How Hans Hess helped athletes from all over the world to gold . AS Verlag , 2018, ISBN 978-3-906055-81-7

Individual evidence

1. ^ Company history , Descente