Review: Le Bent Baselayers and Socks

With all the time I spend thinking about ski gear, there remain some bits that slip through the cracks. Baselayers broadly fall into that category. I’ve mostly just used what is available, cost-effective, or free. Most often, this has meant something along the lines of Patagonia Capilene Midweight bottoms, a basic lightweight T-shirt (most often 32 Below from Costco, sometimes Patagonia Capilene Daily merino), and a sun hoody (usually Arc’Teryx Cormac). This has worked well for me most of the time; the only modification I’ve made is trimming most of my bottoms to ¾ length to prevent bunching above my boots. 

My usual daily setup works pretty well, with only a few downsides. First, the stuff I use is almost all synthetic (aside from a few Patagonia merino shirts), which comes with an associated stink factor. Day to day, not such a big deal. I can do laundry. Traveling or expeditioning, this becomes a bit more of a thing. Sure, we can and need to embrace the stink a bit during an expedition, but in the instance of traveling to ski in developed areas and staying in hotels, showing up in the morning stinky isn’t a great look (smell?).