Six Moon Designs Lunar Solo

Boutique ultralight usually costs a mint—and for good reason. Shaving ounces gets harder and harder the lighter you go and at some point, materials cross what we’ll call the “Dyneema Line,” sending prices to the stratosphere. So it’s with great pleasure that we discovered the Lunar Solo, which uses workaday materials (20-denier, siliconized polyester on the fly; 40-denier in the floor) and a clever-but-not-too-clever pitch with a trekking pole—and still has more floor space (26 square feet) than pretty much all other tents in its class. And it’s cheaper to boot.

Ventilation is superb for a single-wall. Credit the 4-inch-tall band of mesh that wraps around the canopy just above ground level and the vestibule design, which leaves a 12-inch gap between the bottom of the fly and the ground (pitch the door on the lee, pull your boots close to the canopy in heavy rain, and you’ll be fine). “I saw a lot of precip and 20-mph winds in Mississippi’s Buccaneer State Park and, beyond a little splash-up water on the perimeter mesh, I was totally fine,” one tester says. A 48-inch-tall peak height was good enough for our 6’2” tester to change shirt layers without brushing the walls, and there’s space inside for all the gear you don’t want to store in the 8.5-square-foot vestibule. Roll back both sides of the vestibule for that inside-out feeling on nice nights. Note: Seam sealing costs $30 extra. Do it yourself and be sure to dab any loose threads on the floor while you’re at it.