The Patagonia Women’s Ultralight Down Hoody weighing in right around nine ounces the name
speaks for itself. And the way they get that weight down so low is by using premium materials.
The insulation here is 800 fill power goose down, so you have a lot of compressibility
and a lot of warmth for its weight. And one interesting thing to know about the down used
to insulate this jacket is it is 100 percent traceable down. So the birds used were never
live plucked, never force fed. So you can feel good wearing this piece as well. And
the other way they get that weight down is by using pertex quantum material. It is a
15 denier material, so it is very lightweight. But it is also very durable for that weight.
So it has got a mini rip stop in there as well. You have a durable, water repel-lent
finish on the outside. So it is going to hold up to a light rain or a light snow. Water
will bead up and run off of it. It is not completely waterproof, but if you do need
a com-pletely waterproof piece, you can certainly wear a shell over top of it, because of that
lightweight feel, because of that very low profile design.
With that, as well, you have very small baffles here. You have got baffles on the side as
well. So you have got panels with this jacket. You don’t have unwanted shifting of down.
So that is going to keep the down insulation exactly where it needs to be for an extremely
even heat.
The features here are really streamlined and simple in keeping with that lightweight feel.
As the name suggests, you do have a hood here at the top and the hood is really nice. You
have a draw cord that goes around the top and around the back. So you just have one
cinch cord in the back and then you are able to just put the hood on, cinch it down. It
fits really well over your head.
You could definitely wear it with a helmet if you want to. So if I just show that, the
cinch cord in the back is going to cinch down around here and around the top. So the hood
fits really well over your head. It feels really warm and really comfortable on. So
the hood is one of my favorite features about this piece. And even with that hood you have
such a low weight. Like I said, it is right around nine ounces.
You do have a collar here at the top. So if you don’t have the hood on, you can zip
that all the way up and it is not going to irritate your chin. You have got a nice fabric
behind that zipper. You do have a nice pocket right here on the top. The jacket actually
stows into this pocket. So you have a zipper on the inside there. It is a nice place to
store items you want to get your hands on quickly. But with that really small pack size
you can pack this down, throw it in your backpack, clip it to your harness and that makes it
really sim-ple.
You do have a full length zipper here with this piece, so easy on, easy off. Down here
you have two hand level pockets. They are pretty big pockets. You could store an extra
pair of glove or something like that in here. But the insulation is on the outside, so they
are nice hand warmer pockets as well for chilly days.
Down here at the bottom you have one stretchy draw cord, so you can really cinch in that
hem at the bottom. This actually has a little bit longer of a cut. The back here is a little
bit dropped in the hem. So you can really hold in that core heat by cinching down the
draw cord, by putting on that hood. So even though this is such a lightweight piece, it
is very warm for its weight.
Here at the cuffs you have just very stretchy Lycra cuffs. They are lightweight. You don’t
have any adjustability there. But it also seals in your heat at those cuffs.
You have really great range of motion with your arms. So they give you enough room here
in your arms and in your shoulders if you are climbing, if you are hiking, backpack-ing,
traveling in this piece it would be just a really great layering piece as well. It is
low profile enough that you can get layers over top. But I am wearing a small right now
and I feel like I could get some layers on underneath of this. I just have a lightweight
t-shirt on now, but I could put another base layer or something like that underneath of
this piece.
So with all of those premium materials, premium fabrics, that very low weight, the nice baffle
design, this is a great piece for wearing in the backcountry. It is also at home downtown.
It is the Patagonia Women’s Ultralight Down Hoody.