You might have seen that Tom Hardy has been rapping again. The British actor, best known for his roles in Dunkirk, The Dark Knight Rises and Venom, previously did a bit of bar-spitting under the alter ego Frankie Pulitzer in 2021. Now he’s resurrected the alias, dropping an entire album and a music video with his collaborators Czarface, the rap group comprising Wu-Tang Clan member Inspectah Deck and duo 7L & Esoteric. All a bit random, but we’re down with it.
For the album cover and accompanying music video, unveiled at the end of last week, Hardy masked up in a menacing balaclava, Pulitzer’s signature look. But, mainly because we aren’t in the market for a face covering, it was his jacket that caught our attention. Hardy wears a proper heavy-duty ThruDark Rōnin Tanto snow jacket, one of the technical outerwear brand’s hero products.
Founded in 2016 in Poole, Dorset, by former Special Boat Service operators Anthony Stazicker and Louis Tinsley, ThruDark has long been favoured by guys who find solace thousands of feet above sea level. Among them is Nirmal “Nims” Purja, who used custom ThruDark summit suits during his record-breaking “Project Possible” ascent of the world’s 8,000m peaks.
Now, though, the brand is gaining recognition away from high-risk terrain and finding its way onto football terraces (and into rap videos fronted by Hollywood stars). ThruDark has been cropping up among fans, with Reddit users noting a surge in the number of its jackets being worn in the stands. Stephen Howson, a social-media pundit with a decent following among footy fans, has even shown off his own ThruDark “New Matchday coat”.
Could it be the new Stone Island, a brand favoured on the terraces since the 1990s? It sort of looks that way. “At this point I’ve just accepted ThruDark has become a fashion brand, lots of it in the stands at football now,” said one Reddit user. Another said, “When at the emirates somebody came up to say they loved my Engage jacket and where could they get one. Refreshing change from all the Stone Island.”
“We would be flattered to be mentioned alongside a brand like Stone Island,” Anthony “Staz” Stazicker, co-founder of ThruDark, told Esquire. “Their archive is rumoured to be exceptional and their fabric R&D is some of the best in the world. The brands come from very different places of course but our respective commitments to delivering an exceptional product is similar.”
And Hardy’s not alone. Henry Cavill wore a ThruDark cap while barbecuing in the British heat last month, as he shared on Instagram. Is the brand about to go boom? Likely.
“There is always a spike of interest when famous clients wear ThruDark,” says Louis Tinsley, co-founder of ThruDark. “Tom Hardy has supported us from the very beginning and is very committed to the British Armed Forces and veterans so we’re very lucky to call him a friend. He wears ThruDark very well!”
