Born out of love for the most extreme places on the planet, Aura is a Poland-based outdoor equipment brand that applies synthetic and down insulation to their cold weather product line. Today, thanks to three decades of expedition experience, Aura offers the highest quality products ranging from life-saving mountain rescue sleds to sleek city jackets.
Aura’s logo — simple geometric shapes representing a peak enclosed in a circle —evokes the values at the heart of the brand: a passion for the mountains and the ambition to provide the best protection against the elements. Both were epitomized in the first Aura product: a custom-made Karakoram expedition jacket for Wanda Rutkiewicz in 1989. Over thirty years later, Aura continues to work with professional explorers, serves the global consumer market (Japan being the latest frontier), and fulfils military orders for special forces deployment.
Aura’s owners have kept their manufacturing local in Poland, allowing them to maintain their team’s collective experience and ensure their company’s ethics.
The ultimate fusion for ultimate warmth
To create products that perform well in the harshest mountain environments, Aura’s designs often blend both down and Climashield® synthetic insulation. BAZ-1 is an expedition basecamp sleeping bag with a comfort rating of -19°F (-28°C), benefitting from 42oz (1200g) of the highest quality down, as well as Climashield®’s premium continuous filament insulation.
Out of concern for animal welfare, Aura only uses Polish down from trusted suppliers who have a detailed knowledge of how to care for their birds. Ensuring excellence depends on high quality food and healthy living conditions, and experience shows that maintaining the birds’ natural cycles produces the best results.
To create BAZ-1, Aura designers decided to reimagine what makes an expedition sleeping bag stating – “We did not want to reach for known solutions and work on their improvement. We wanted to investigate the problem from scratch.” The result is a sleeping bag with two separate YKK zippers, one at the feet and one at the head, with no side zipper to prevent any unnecessary heat loss. In addition, the hood of the bag is integrated with its main part, creating a more comfortable and spacious sleeping environment. The hybrid construction of the outer fabric — waterproof in the most vulnerable areas and partly highly breathable on the main surface — ensures optimal moisture management.
The innovative feature of BAZ-1 is the use of Climashield® continuous filament synthetic insulation around the collar of the sleeping bag, as well as the top and bottom zippers. A thermal imaging camera was used to assess the efficiency of this solution, confirming that the heat loss through the zipper had been reduced to zero. For the ultimate breathability, the choice of Climashield® for the collar of the bag also reduces problems associated with breath condensation.
The BAZ-1 is available in two sizes, with eight different filling options (from 12oz to 42oz of down, 600 or 800 fill power).*
