My issue with women's outerwear is twofold.
- It seems like mostly men are designing women's outerwear.. the colors, the materials, the fit, a lot of it screams 'a dude designed this'. Never mind a women's-dedicated company, I have a novel idea... how about companies just hire some women skiers to design women's ski clothing??...
I sound like an arc'teryx fangirl, and maybe I am (the stuff just fits though! plus now there is an outlet 20 min from home), but I remember 3 or 4 years ago I saw a little video on how they did this. These two women were talking about how they designed the women's ski line, I think it was, and I remember those new fits. The shaping makes a huge difference. But it's impractically expensive for most consumers and/or people who don't live near an outlet.
But I'm sure most companies are aware of this and at least trying; it's the smaller ones with fewer resources (ie where this topic started) that aren't doing it "properly" yet. It's understandable. It's easier for women just to wear a small in a men's product for the time being.
And pockets. Yeah. FlyLow does great pockets, but its fit is pretty uncomplicated. Including good pockets
and a flattering fit on a woman's smaller torso seems pretty difficult. That's why I loooove big pockets on the pant legs (Sentinel pant, I'm talking to you). Solves that problem. But yeah, that photo
@Drahtguy Kevin posted of me knee-deep in the powder somewhere, you can see what happens when you fill up the pockets on a puffy ski jacket. (I look at the pic and of course I'm reminiscing about a sublime pow day, but mostly I'm thinking, When did I gain 20lb?)