Who here doesn’t know the Pencott family of camouflage patterns? Pencott has become extremely popular because it simply works! Pattern elements achieve a three dimensional effect; the illusion of depth. In addition to commercial success, they are also used by professionals (like Austrian counter-terrorist unit Cobra). Since the very beginnings, Perunika has worked as an ‘ambassador’ for Pencott in Slovenia, and our product range in Pencott is only increasing. Pencott was always known for its specialization; a special pattern for a pre-defined terrain. The urban version of the pattern was mentioned early in 2013, but the real prototype saw the light of day in 2017, when it was presented at various fairs (about which we also wrote). Now we finally have the opportunity to put the Metropolis pattern to use, where it belongs!

In the Perunika online shop, all Pencott gear and clothing can be found in the following category:

1. Pencott pattern products

Pencott Metropolis presentation

Pencott Metropolis is a military pattern made for urban environment and operations. Where Kryptek, Crye Precision (MultiCam), A-TACS and others went with black base and are more (tacti)-cool than actually useful, Metropolis went with distinctly brown and brighter palette. Reason: brighter colors become darker in low light conditions, but because of the digital pattern it stills masks the silhouette. Used tones are more natural and organic and the pattern actually works great.

Pencott Metropolis, slika PineSurvey
Pencott Metropolis, photo PineSurvey

David from PineSurvey writes:

Having in mind that the urban landscape is completely different than the countryside, woods, wetlands or whatever environment you might think of, we have to understand several things:

1. In the city you are either completely in the open, or you have plenty of structures which offer either concealment or cover, most of the time even both. In that particular case you do not need camouflage at all, since you have a physical object behind which you can hide or take cover.

2. If you are in the open, you have to deal with quickly changing environments. This is not the type of “I am going from the desert dunes into the oasis” kind of problem. This is the “I am going from a white painted wall, to a brick wall, change to a concrete background and suddenly have glass window behind me” scenario.

As a result, urban patterns are the most difficult to design, since they not only need to blend in, using a certain color palette, but also need to disrupt and confuse vision, to reduce the time for the user to be identified. There are plenty of “urban” camouflage patterns out there, specifically designed for Law Enforcement and the Military. Some are mainly grey, some are extremely black dominant. For a very long time it seems the consensus was that it has to be this way. They also differ in their purpose. So while for example ATACS-AU is designed to blend (a bit too well since it turns into a greyish color at 10m distance), ATACS-LE was designed to purely look aggressive. The same can be said about Multicam Black which is literally described with the purpose to “project(s) a distinctly authoritative presence appropriate for domestic operations.”

In his conclusion after several testings of Metropolis pattern in different environments and light conditions he writes:

In this myriad of urban camouflage patterns PenCott Metropolis is an interesting and effective option to consider. As already mentioned, I regard it as the most interesting and versatile of the whole PenCott family. As a result Metropolis works because it uses three aspects of camouflage: Depth, Blending and disruption. This is done by the PenCott pattern’s macro, midi, and micro elements as well as the specific choice of colors which result in a very organic look.

Please do check out all the testing with various photographs on his web page:

1. http://pinesurvey.com/fieldtest-pencott-metropolis-part-1/

2. http://pinesurvey.com/fieldtest-pencott-metropolis-part-2/

3. http://pinesurvey.com/fieldtest-alpine-camo/

Pencott Metropolis first delivery?

So why do we ask for your help? We plan to order Pencott Metropolis directly from the production. If we can count on partner support and European dealers for other patterns, we are alone with Metropolis. We face great shipping costs, import taxes etc. so we are looking for an optimal ratio to lower the final price and avoid long stock turn-over.

The material we are looking at is genuine mil-spec NYCO 50-50 ripstop, that is material for clothing systems in 50% cotton and 50% nylon (polyamide) blend. It’s very robust, doesn’t tear and has low IR visibility (NIR). We are talking about best quality which we can always expect from Pencott. According to current expectations we expect lower price than is standard for Pencott NYCO in Europe, that is bellow 28 € per meter. Final price and discount will be based on our wholesome order and of course the quantity of each customer.

Uniform and clothes will not be manufactured by us, but we have already partnered with various manufacturers, where everyone will be able to make his uniform without our interference. We even have the option of manufacturing Gearskin in Metropolis, so that anyone can change his equipment, rifle etc. to Metropolis.

So, do you want the Pencott Metropolis in the NYCO ripstop material too? Please write to us at info@perunika.org and help us establish some general interest and idea how much of it we actually need.