Review: Cloudveil Cool Shirt
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Hey guys –
I wore a new Cloudveil Cool Shirt today on the Holston River while floating with Caesar Stair. This shirt is pretty-highly ad-schwagged/achronized: SPF 45, DWR coating, polyester microfiber blend, etc.
Generally I take things like this with a grain of salt: fishing shirts have long been renamed “technical clothing” in an attempt to make them more fishing-exclusive, thus differentiating them from every other kind of “sporting” garment. In reality, this usually boiled down to adding pockets on top of pockets on top of pockets (See: Columbia Shirt of Choice).
The Cloudveil Cool shirt does a great job of NOT being just another fishing shirt. Like Simms’ newest 2006 lineup and Patagonia’s post-2002 shirts, slim is the new slim. Instead of massive amounts of puff-out pockets, in the new categories we see welded seams (for svelte-ness), hidden, interior pockets, and lots of perks like secret, under-collar buttons to keep collars down on a motor run (Patagonia) or special sunglasses slip-pockets (Cloudveil Cool Shirt).
The sunglasses pocket on my Cool Shirt works great for your shades or a cellphone, and the shirt also has large side-zip breastpockets which are a little too tempting. By the end of the float I had my wallet, a cell phone, my keys, my audio recorder, a lenscap, a stack of filters, a CF Designs flybox, and my shades ALL in my two front pockets! Don’t give in to this temptation. Yes, the pockets held them all, but I looked like an 80 year old granny getting “dolled up for the town” in a Goodwill-bin “Like a Virgin-video” bra!
Cloudveil’s done some things right with this shirt. First, the colors are muted; blue (mine), khaki, pale green, and yellow are the only options. Simms and Patagonia have some muted shirts, too, but they also both offer insurance-salesmen’s-tie repeating fish prints (Patagonia) and 1960s plaid upholstery (Simms) looks. Second, the collar is tall, which can give you a bit of a Bill Murray vibe at first, but it comes in handy when the sun is beating down and you need to cover up.
Last, this Cool shirt really lived up to its technical billing. All my sweat was wicked away despite 75 degree temps and a 3 mile row over slick water. (I had on a capilene undershirt). The DWR coating really works; in addition to watching splashed water bead up on my sleeve, my dunked cuffs dried out within 10 minutes. I am sunburn free, which is pretty amazing given how light the shirt is. Finally, I stayed as cool as is reasonably possible given the fact that I had my sleeves down and my collar up. On the whole, a big thumbs up for Cloudveil. This is a shirt worth buying, despite the $68 price tag (note: this is still considerably lower than most of Simms, which are leaking into the $80-90 category. Patagonia seems to be pretty competitive).
Cloudveil’s Longsleeve Cool ShirtZach
It gets my vote too.
I have last years similar version. Mainly a full zip in place of button-up front. It really is versatile shirt. Last week I used it on a 13 mile trail run after a moring of back-country brookie fishing. It performed nice as a wind block as well as a sun block too.They, (Cloudveil) really have some nice stuff out this year.
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