Outdoor clothing is often discussed as though there is a correct answer. There is a right jacket, the right boot, the right fabric, the right number of layers. Then you go outside and discover that the weather has not read the catalogue.
The more I have spent time outdoors, the less interested I have become in finding the perfect piece of clothing and the more interested I have become in what clothing is actually doing. It is shelter. It regulates heat, deals with moisture, blocks wind, keeps insects out, protects us around fire and, occasionally, determines whether we are comfortable enough to notice anything else. Style gets a vote too, although it probably should not be allowed to chair the meeting.
I was reminded of this one winter when a group of international outdoor recreation students came to Canada to experience winter camping, bushcraft and tracking. They arrived looking exactly as you might expect future outdoor professionals to look. Modern shells, fleece layers, technical footwear, high-tech snowshoes. I arrived at the other end of the clothing spectrum wearing traditional snowshoes, wool from head to toe, leather mitts and a Hudson Bay blanket made into a coat. The temperature was around minus 30 Celsius. By evening, while we were out looking at animal tracks, I was warm enough to have the blanket coat open. The students were beginning to look rather less enthusiastic about standing still.
It was not proof that old clothing is better than new clothing. It was proof that clothing has a job to do, and the job changes with circumstances. If you are moving hard through snow, you have different problems from someone standing still. If it is wet, wind matters differently. If you are sitting beside a fire, synthetic fabric has some additional considerations. If you are in the Arctic, the rules become more particular still. Clothing is less a uniform than a negotiation.
Layering is one of the simplest expressions of that negotiation. Instead of asking one garment to do everything, you divide the work. An underlayer manages moisture and sits against the body. Insulation provides warmth. An outer shell deals with wind, rain and snow. When you are working hard, you remove layers before you become soaked with your own effort. When you stop, you put them back on before the cold has a chance to collect the debt.
That last part is easy to underestimate. In the outdoors, problems are often cumulative rather than dramatic. You are a little damp. Then you are tired. Then the wind picks up. Then you discover that you are hungry. None of these things, by itself, is particularly impressive. Together they can become a fairly persuasive argument. Clothing is one of the places where small decisions accumulate.
Cotton gets much of the attention in this conversation because of its reputation for becoming a liability when wet. And in cold, wet conditions it can be. But even cotton refuses to stay in its assigned role. In a hot environment, a wet cotton shirt can be useful. In the Arctic, I have used cotton as an outer shell over warmer layers because the cold, dry conditions were doing something very different from a rainy Ontario afternoon. The same material can be sensible in one environment and foolish in another.
Wool is similarly interesting because it does not need perfect conditions to remain useful. It can absorb moisture and still provide warmth. It works as an underlayer, an insulating layer, socks, mitts, hats and even improvised wrist gaskets. An old wool sock with a hole in the heel does not necessarily become garbage. Cut off the foot and you have a tube that can cover the gap between your coat and mitts. It is not particularly glamorous. It is, however, quite good at being there.
Traditional materials make the same point in a more dramatic way. When I lived in the Arctic, I used caribou clothing. The material was remarkably warm and light, and the footwear looked more like slippers than winter boots. The clothing was not designed around the assumptions of modern outdoor retail. It was designed around a particular place, a particular climate and a particular need. I even kept the caribou clothing in the freezer and lightly dampened the leather before putting it on so it would remain flexible. It sounds like a poor beginning to a clothing review. In that environment, it made perfect sense.
Modern materials, of course, have their own advantages. Down creates an excellent insulating layer because of the amount of still air it can hold, and it packs into a remarkably small space. That makes a down jacket particularly useful when you have been working hard and then stop. Pull it from the pack, put it on, and suddenly the heat you were producing five minutes earlier has somewhere to stay. Wear that same jacket while breaking trail through deep snow and you may simply manufacture a damp sleeping bag inside your coat.
That is one of the recurring oddities of outdoor clothing. A feature that is excellent in one circumstance becomes a problem in another. Breathability is useful until it is raining hard. Waterproofing is useful until you are sweating inside it. Bulk is useful for insulation but less useful when you have to carry it uphill. Lightweight footwear feels wonderfully freeing until you need enough insulation for deep winter. Aggressive boot tread gives you impressive grip and can also give a well-used trail an increasingly impressive collection of erosion problems.
Even the head is part of this ongoing argument. A hat is not merely something you wear because Canadians have apparently agreed that winter requires one. Wind can strip away the warm layer around your head surprisingly efficiently. A fur-edged hood works partly by interrupting that moving air before it reaches your face. In summer, I have taken a wool hat, soaked it in water and put it back on. The same material that helps retain heat in one situation can help keep the sun off and hold cool moisture in another.
Rain gear presents perhaps the clearest example of the compromise. A waterproof shell keeps rain off, but it cannot completely prevent the body underneath from producing its own weather. When you work hard, you can become wet from the inside while remaining perfectly protected from the rain outside. Sometimes, in a light mist, allowing clothing to breathe may be more comfortable than sealing yourself inside a waterproof shell. In a hard rain, that calculation changes. The rain gets a vote.
So does fire. Leather is not particularly elegant in the rain, but it is comfortable, reasonably resistant to sparks and acquires an excellent campfire smell. Synthetic clothing has many virtues, but some synthetic fabrics have the unfortunate characteristic of turning a careless encounter with a fire into an expensive collection of ventilation holes. A couple of holes and five hundred dollars later, the lesson can become quite memorable.
Footwear introduces another set of compromises. Weight matters because anything attached to the end of your leg has to be moved with every step. Stiffness matters too. Aggressive tread can affect a trail. Ankle support may be useful for some people and restrictive for others. Winter footwear needs enough bulk to insulate, but bulk has a weight of its own. Gaiters can keep snow, water, burrs and ticks out, which is a respectable amount of work for something that mostly looks like a fabric sleeve.
By the time we get to insects, clothing has become less about comfort than about negotiating with the local population. Long sleeves, hats, handkerchiefs, gaiters and tightly closed cuffs can all change how accessible you are to mosquitoes, deer flies and ticks. The woods are not particularly interested in whether your clothing looks technical. They are interested in whether they can get through it.
That may be the larger lesson in all of this. Outdoor clothing is often sold as a collection of solutions, but outside there are mostly trade-offs. Natural fibres have advantages and limitations. Synthetic materials have advantages and limitations. Traditional clothing can be remarkably sophisticated without looking sophisticated. Modern clothing can be remarkably effective while occasionally solving one problem by creating another. The useful question is not, “What is the best clothing?” It is, “What does this particular place require from me today?”
That question tends to simplify things.
You start looking at the weather rather than the label. You notice whether you are moving or standing still. You pay attention to dampness before it becomes a problem. You consider the fire before you sit beside it. You notice the bugs. You notice the trail beneath your feet. You start choosing clothing for the place you are actually in rather than the wilderness you saw in the advertisement.
Eventually, the clothing becomes less noticeable.
Which is probably what good outdoor clothing was supposed to do in the first place.
The Essentials of Outdoor Clothing, Parts 1 and 2 are Episodes 8 and 9 of the Reverie Nature Podcast.