Pearson Hard As Nails Merino Head Warmer

The Pearson Merino Head Warmer is lovely – it's thin enough to stay comfy under a helmet, warm enough to be worth bothering with, and breathable enough to leave on when you're working hard. It's expensive and you can get similar performance for less, but still, you're unlikely to regret treating your noggin to this.

This is a very fancy fabric. It's 80% merino wool, and it's MAPP merino too, which means it's been tested for fibre strength and consistency, apparently, and has only been processed in very eco-friendly ways. The remaining 20% is nylon to add a bit of stretch, which is necessary as there's only one size.

It's stitched together very neatly along robust-looking seams, and the result is really everything you could want: it's slim and very light so it fits under helmets or in jersey pockets very well; it's soft and usefully warm for its weight; it breathes impressively enough you don't just boil your head; and it works as well when it's wet as when it's dry. It dries pretty quickly, too.

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The weather during the test was very changeable, swinging from so cold it was too icy to ride to mild and extremely wet, but I still found this useful on a fair amount of rides (especially night rides). It can cope with a fair range of temperatures, and I personally felt comfortable in it up to eight or nine degrees, because it deals with sweat and slightly excess heat very well.

The seams aren't completely flat but caused me no problems, and neither did the rose logo, even though I expected it to as it's particularly thick. I keep my hair pretty short so it's not like I've got an unusual amount of padding; I think you'd be unlucky to have issues with anything digging in, especially as it's so stretchy.

Basically, this was never anything but comfortable and pleasingly warm, and when it got too warm it was very easy to stow. At 21g you don't know it's there.

Value and conclusion

This hat will lighten your wallet nicely too. At £25 it's more than £1 per gram, and a similar price to the Galibier Barrier Merino Head Set (£26.25) even though that includes a neck warmer as well. That said, the Pearson is much better sized and shaped for use under a helmet, and the Galibier uses considerably less merino at 50%.

Much cheaper options are out there: the Lusso Thermal Skull Hat is nothing particularly fancy at all, but it will keep your head warm and costs just £10.

Though undoubtedly expensive against the competition, the Pearson hat is also very lovely to wear. You don't need to spend this much, but if you do, you'll be very happy with the result.

Verdict

Very comfortable with excellent performance thanks to high merino content, but expensive