Patagonia's Riverside Warehouse

Photo: Julie Brown

Patagonia’s Riverside Warehouse

The wader-repair department at Patagonia is a standalone, self-sustained operation in a hard-to-find corner of a 342,000-square-foot warehouse in Reno, Nevada, just steps from the rainbows, browns, and—as of last summer—native Lahontan cutthroat of the Truckee River. The department is little more than a series of temporary walls erected on the edge of the receiving…

The beauty of SaraBella goes beyond pretty colors

Rodmaking Rose

BEFORE APRIL ARCHER cofounded Denver-based SaraBella Fishing—makers of women-specific fly rods—she’d already noticed an influx of female flyfishers to the sport. But as an angler herself, fishing since she was a toddler and flyfishing for the past 16 years, she also recognized that there was a distinct lack of women-specific gear.

Drone Zone

IN THE SHOWTIME SERIES HOMELAND, Carrie Mathison, played by actress Claire Danes, leads drone strikes against terrorists from the comfort of her CIA station. But the same technology that makes drones—also known as unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs—convenient military weapons, has also helped advance the careers of real-world civilians, including a growing list of flyfishing…

Western Rivers Flyfisher is based in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Western Rivers Flyfisher

Try this on for size. Close your eyes and imagine a flyshop more interested in amplifying experience than sticking you with spools of $14 tippet, dozens of hyperanatomical flavor-of-the-day flies, and pearl strands of pink thingamabobbers. Imagine that this same flyshop has invested in this “experience giving” commodity for 25 consecutive years, pushing things like…

Northwoods Angler in Whitefish, Montana.

Northwoods Angler

WHITEFISH, MT—Scott Fenwick says Northwoods Angler “isn’t your regular fly shop.” It only takes a few seconds inside to understand what he’s talking about. There are rare books, collectible paintings, antique signs and surfboards scattered among the requisite flies, rods and other fishing gear. In one room, underneath a television displaying a flyfishing adventure documentary,…