Durston tents and backpacks are designed by Dan Durston in the heart of the Canadian Rockies in Golden, BC.
Dan has been a hiker and adventurer for nearly 20 years. He has amassed hundreds of nights in the outdoors and written thousands of technical gear posts in ultralight online communities like BackpackingLight.com and r/Ultralight. Never content with the status quo, Dan has been building his own gear for over a decade, including building a tent with DCF way back in 2009 before most other companies working with DCF even existed.
Dan is continually pushing the limits of outdoor adventure. His travels include hiking the 2600 mile Pacific Crest Trail (2014) and the first yo-yo of Canada’s Great Divide Trail (1100km x 2, 2017) along with his wife T, who also helps with Durston gear. Dan also held the Fastest Known Time on the 90 km Stein Traverse (19 hours) and is the 5x fastest finisher in the Bob Marshall Wilderness Open (~100-mile off-season traverse of the Montana Rockies). He has worked as a gear tester and ambassador for small gear brands, reviewed gear for Backpackinglight.com, and established remote off-trail hiking/scrambling routes.
With Durston gear, Dan combines his comprehensive technical knowledge with extensive field experience to design the highest performance ultralight equipment. His designs achieve this through extensive thought about how to solve real-world problems using a first principles design philosophy. With the core design developed, we then work with several of the world’s top outdoor gear factories to produce the gear at the highest build quality. The factories we use also build gear for top brands like Arcteryx, MSR, and Big Agnes.
Our first tent – the X-Mid 1P – was introduced to widespread acclaim in 2018 through a partnership with Drop.com. Since then, Dan has added another tent (X-Mid 2P) and backpack (DD40) with Drop. In 2022 the X-Mid distribution transitioned from Drop.com to Kaviso. Durston Gear is currently working on a line of accessories and a new DCF X-Mid which are being sold independently on Durstongear.com
