A Camouflage Clothing Line Wants to Be Lululemon for Hunters

Jason Hairston is on the hunt for a different outdoorsman.

- Kyle Stock

Killing a Canadian mountain sheep is a little like climbing Everest. It’s expensive and arduous and typically involves terrible weather. Clothing is critical, but hunters can’t wear the garish, down-stuffed suits that climbers in the Himalayas favor. Sheep, it turns out, have incredible eyesight: Sophisticated camouflage is essential. “I’d say 80 percent of the hunters I know wear Kuiu,” says Bob House, who charges $40,000 for guided expeditions in the Yukon. “I absolutely love it when my client steps off the plane and is fully outfitted in that stuff.” If paying tens of thousands of dollars and traveling to a remote part of Canada to kill sheep doesn’t already signal how serious someone is, Kuiu does.

Unless you’re an experienced sheep stalker, you’ve probably never heard of Kuiu, named after an Alaskan island and pronounced “koo-yoo.” But the company is conferring on hunting gear the status that Patagonia did for outdoorwear and Lululemon Athletica did for yoga pants. Kuiu is making it lighter, more water-resistant, more breathable, and better looking—an upgrade to what’s been previously available, which has been as oblivious to performance, fit, and aesthetics as a deer on the opening day of hunting season.