Wool for lite gear

Does anyone know of lite weight gear from natural wools? I'm trying to stay away from synthetics. thanks!

Smartwool and IceBreaker are the “biggies” that leap to mind. Some house brands (like REI’s “Co-op” stuff may also have high wool content in some pieces; you’ll just have to check in the individual specifications.

You will have some difficulties finding 100% wool; while there are some, it is far more common to find high-wool content garments (for example, 86% wool, 8% acrylic, 6% spandex) because the synthetics help garments retain their shape and fit.

If, by "gear" you mean clothing, then the brands Glenn named are all widely available. The easiest wool clothing to find will be 'base layers' and hats. Pants and shirts will not be nearly as easy and may not fit your idea of lightweight. As for the many other pieces of "gear" needed for backcountry camping, avoiding synthetic materials will be nearly impossible if you want lightweight. You'll need to get heavily into making your own gear.

I have an alpaca hoodie that I bought in Peru for about $12 that is just about as warm as a lighter down puffy. And it's just as light. The only drawback is that it doesn't compact as much as down. I love it, and use it all the time on trips.

I used a thick wool sweater that my mother knit for me in 1952 for nearly 20 years, much of it in the Sierra. It was knit from fairly loose-spun, large diameter yarn. My records show it at about 19 oz. I used it through the 70’s as part of my then primitive layering system of a long-John shirt, sweater and parka. It finally wore-out/unraveled. I then used a repurposed cashmere sweater for several years together with a Pendleton wool shirt in cool, wet country (mostly in the North Cascades) and then finally switched over to Capilene or Merino, fleece, and down or synthetic puffy. My wool pants were army surplus.

I was rarely cold in my wool clothing nor have I suffered in my base-layer, fleece, down coat and parka. The wool was nearly twice as heavy and bulkier though.

As Aimless mentioned, you may want to learn to sew: and knit.