Criterion Activity Ultralight Down Jacket – Performance

The new Activity jacket is a properly light and packable, old school, lightweight down jacket. The basics are mostly right: the 850 fill power goose down gives a properly lofty feel and great warmth to weight ratio. And the Pertex fabrics are some of the best out there.

Stuffed into its inside chest pocket, it’s neat and small enough to stick in a day pack without fretting over weight or volume. For reference, it’s around 2/3s the size of a comparable synthetic-filled jacket and, we reckon, appreciably warmer.

Just Down

One thing to be aware of is that the down isn’t water resistant. That doesn’t mean that light rain will be a problem, untreated down will still cope with around 20 minutes of wetness before things go wrong, but it does mean you need to be more careful and that the jacket is best suited to indoor use or cold, dry conditions outside. The Pertex Quantum outer does have a DWR by the way, so the odd splash isn’t a problem.

We found it great for cold weather tent and hut use, but less useful for anything active. The jacket is cut relatively short and while it has ample chest and shoulder room, it’s quite snug on the waist and we found it tended to ride up and stay up. The elasticated hem doesn’t help here.

Hoods Up

On the plus side, the hood is big enough to take a helmet if you wish, but adjustable down to normal head size using a top draw-cord, plus the collar is high enough to nestle comfortably over your chin. You could, conceivably use it as a very light belay jacket in cold, dry conditions, but you might need to go up a size plus the light, silky Quantum fabric isn’t the most rugged out there based on our past experience.

Finally, and this a minor thing, the zip pulls have no tags or cord making them slippy with gloved fingers. We added some thin cord temporarily, but it would have been nice if zip-pulls had been supplied.