There’s enough lore about the early days of Patagonia to rival a Tolkien novel, but one of my personal favorite tales concerns the origin of the fleece jacket. According to Patagonia’s marketing team, ...

I can still remember my shock when my ex-girlfriend’s mother—the matriarch of a New England family that lived in L.L. Bean fleece—told me that it wasn’t actually wool. And if something called “fleece” ...