Think Round. (Think Fat!) Down Is In Again

CLOTHING suitable for the Himalayas has become stylish streetwear in New York. Sta-Puff Marshmallow men and women now float down the avenues and bump about in buses and subway cars.
Fur is out. Goose is in.
The bane of coat-check people everywhere, down-filled coats, which seemed to come and go in the 1970's and 80's, are in again. The look for winter is fat, as in Triple Fat Goose down. Lots of "loft," or puffiness, is considered cool. The operative word is big.
 "They all want the Michelin look now," said Michael Slepian, the owner of Down Generation, on Columbus Avenue between 95th and 96th Streets.
The racks at Down Generation are so crammed with coats you have to dig in with both arms to pull a fat one out. Mr. Slepian holds up some particularly fat specimens: the Dahlagari by North Face, named for the Himalayan mountain, with two and a half pounds of down and Gore-Tex waterproof fabric; or the Brooks Range, quilted in black with North Face in bold white letters, temperature rated to minus-38 degrees.
Down Generation also sells a good selection of Triple Fat Goose brand down-and-feather coats, well priced at about $125, including National Football League stadium coats.
For downtown down, there is Paragon Sporting Goods, at Broadway and 17th Street, one of those quintessential New York stores, owned by the Blank family since 1908. The hot jacket here is the Marmot (don't pronounce the French way, MAR-moh; it's named for the rodent). The Marmot Mammoth, at $419, latex catsuits, has a Gore-Tex shell and a lot of loft.
Paragon also has a good selection of coats by North Face, Woolrich and Barrier, a down-filled parka with a shearling collar. The store also sells Lectra-Mits, fleece-lined gloves with a battery-operated heating unit.
Eddie Bauer, the Chicago-based retail and catalogue company, made its name outfitting American troops for cold climates during World War II. Its new Manhattan store, on Madison Avenue at 59th Street, is a paradise for seekers of burly, cozy things, including Harris Tweed driving hats, with Thinsulate lining and flaps, for $30; fringed blanket skirts, $90; stone-washed corduroys, $34.99. And the warmest coat at Eddie Bauer is the Superior Polar Parka, which comes in tall sizes and is temperature-rated to minus-70 degrees.
Designers are also getting into the puffed-up look. Ralph Lauren based his fall collection on elegant ski wear. Even Jean-Paul Gaultier, the adventurous French designer, has his version, a taffeta bomber jacket, for expeditions downtown.