Sunset, the long-running magazine devoted to life in the American West, has just handed out trophies for its first annual Best Product Awards, and the list doubles as a tidy gift guide ahead of the holidays. Editors tested every entry themselves — at home, on the road, and outdoors — judging each item on how it looked, felt, and crucially, how it held up once real life got to it. That real-world testing angle matters more than the usual spec-sheet roundup: these are things that survived actual trips, dinners, and garden weekends.
The winners are sorted into nine categories, and travellers will want to head straight for two of them. "Travel, Luggage, and On-the-Go" covers bags and accessories for getting around, while "Outdoor Performance and Apparel" focuses on clothing built for hikes, ski towns, and coastal weekends — the kind of kit the West's national parks and trail networks demand. Between them, they read as a starter packing list for anyone planning a trip to California, the Pacific Northwest, or the mountain states.
The rest of the line-up rounds out the lifestyle side of a holiday. "Kitchen and Cooking Gear" and "Home, Design, and Decor" speak to the region's indoor entertaining habits, while "Garden and Landscape Tools" and "Outdoor Living and Backyard" nod to the climate that lets Westerners live outside much of the year. There are also categories for "Smart Home, Tech, and Clean Living," "Wellness, Sleep, and Self-Care," and "Sustainable Everyday Essentials" — the last one a sign of where shopper priorities have landed.
What's the takeaway for a traveller? If you're shopping for the person in your life who's always heading somewhere, or upgrading your own carry-on before a new year of trips, this list is a vetted shortcut: everything on it has been used, worn, and washed by an editor who had no stake in liking it. Sunset notes it may earn a commission on purchases, standard for gift guides, but the picks are framed as genuine favorites rather than paid placements. The winners skew toward clever upgrades and items that simply get the basics right — a useful lens when you're choosing between a dozen similar-looking duffel bags or merino base layers online.
Full details on each winning product live on Sunset's site, where the guide is paired with other seasonal features, from non-pumpkin Thanksgiving pies to a tour of a waterfront home built with biophilic design.
