Stunning Car Details
Notable Knife Designers
DISPLAY UNTIL DECEMBER, 10TH 2018
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Inside Horween Leather Company
Essential Overshirts
Affordable Dress Watches
1,000 Miles in Modern Grand Tourers
S E V E N
Rugged Fall Boots
The State of Brick & Mortar
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THE EVOLUTION CONTINUES Snowboarding’s quickest and most intuitive boot to binding interface for Women, Men, and now Kids.
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GEAR GUIDE Style & Design 2018
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ENGINEERED OVERKILL
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BEHIND THE BLADE
Commuting is hell. Velomacchi engineers motorcycle gear that's tough-as-nails and made to last.
A look at the pocketknife industry through the lens of its designers, their knives and the features that set them apart.
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DEATH OF DESIGN
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THE NEW CLASS OF FITNESS MAGS
Can simple, elegant, purposeful vehicles exist today? The answer is no, but for complex reasons.
Fitness publications, covering everything from running to tennis to martial arts, that look good enough to keep on your coffee table.
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PROS KNOW BEST
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AHEAD OF THEIR TIME
Do athletes in the outdoor industry really have meaningful input on product design? Four pros weigh in.
Five companies show that there’s more than one way to display information on a watch dial.
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MY THREE WATCH COLLECTION
What if you had to pare your collection down to only three pieces? Three watch industry heavyweights weigh in.
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THE ESSENTIAL FALL LAYER
On its own or worn underneath a heartier coat, the shirt jacket is an indispensable part of your cool-weather wardrobe.
FORMAT THRONE 140 MEDIUM 144 UPGRADE WARS
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FIRE WALKERS
These boots from Northwestern shoemakers are crafted to withstand flames, uneven terrain and a lifetime of wear.
148 OLDFASHIONED
Medium format cameras have never been more approachable. Here are three picks at three price points.
The story behind Cosm, the chair Herman Miller hopes will define a new generation of office seating.
Few home designs are as classic as the Georgian kitchen, and few companies do it better than Plain English.
ABOUT THAT COVER
This issue’s cover, shot on film by Nick Horween for 'Leatherbound' (page 190), is all about the thesis of this issue: style and design. It also demonstrates the breadth of storytelling that our team is striving for throughout the book. It’s a quiet moment and perhaps a bit atypical for us. But it represents a distinct moment for Gear Patrol — one where the definition of Product Journalism is at once expanding and honing. We’re telling stories that don’t just get people excited about a thing or an object or a category, but in the people, places and processes that surround them. — h e n r y p h i l l i p s , d e p u t y p h o t o e d i t o r
TO FIND NEW STYLES AND GREAT FITS, VISIT WRANGLER.COM
FEATURES Style & Design 2018
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DREAM CRUISE
Grand tourers are made to extract the very best out of the driving experience. During a 1,000-mile trip through Michigan, we examined the spectrum of grand tourers to understand the current state of the car. — n i c k c a r u s o
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INTERVIEW: LISA YAMAI
This year marks Snow Peak's 60th anniversary. In this Q&A, the brand's creative director, Lisa Yamai (whose grandfather started Snow Peak in the '50s), talks about what she's doing to shape its future. — a l i c a r r t r o x e l l
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WHAT'S IN STORE?
The Internet has made it possible to get almost anything delivered to your door. So what's the point of stores? These days, retailers are working just as hard to craft an experience as they are to make a sale. — j o h n z i e n t e k
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LEATHER BOUND
Chicago's Horween Leather Company was founded in 1905 with a singular mission: to make the world's best leather. Five generations later, it's become its own globally recognized brand. — s t i n s o n c a r t e r
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DESIGN BY ACCIDENT
The Grace family's kitchen-tool empire, Microplane, was anything but planned. We traveled to Russellville, Arkansas, to learn how Richard Grace invented his cheese-grating masterpiece — by accident. — w i l l p r i c e
YOUR OFFICE OUT OF OFFICE. INTRODUCING THE TOCAYO BACKPACK TM
Whether you’re in an urban jungle or an actual jungle, reliable gear is critical. The Tocayo backpack is our firstever bag built for both weekday and weekend endeavors, engineered for those who need to take their work with them wherever they go. Rugged on the outside and organized on the inside; it’s the everyday bag that’s mastered every detail.
GREAT DESIGN BEGETS GREAT PRODUCTS Offices have been on my mind lately. At the end of August, I had the opportunity to visit the Swiss town of Schaffhausen, population 34,000, located about an hour north of Zurich. I was there on an invitation to attend the opening ceremony of IWC’s new manufakturzentrum, where, in celebration of its 150th anniversary, the company had recently centralized its key processes and watch manufacturing. After a look behind the scenes — in a word, "impressive" — I sat down for a coffee with Christoph GraingerHerr, who's not only the brand’s incoming 39-year old CEO but also the architect and designer of the facility. His charge with the factory was to "create a space of innovation for the next 150 years," he said. That’s a hell of a long time, but it makes sense. IWC was founded by a former soldier, F.A. Jones, who uprooted his life in Brooklyn and moved to Switzerland to bring a decidedly modern approach to pocketwatch-making. Like many watch brands, the story of IWC is heavily imbued with product design and factory lore. Products are born from places where people, ideas and tools are housed. These facilities, whether they are factories, offices or headquarters, are essentially the product that bears products. As my trip was ending, I coincidentally booked a red-eye to another mecca of innovation, Apple Park, the new home of Apple, for its annual September event where the brand unveils its newest wares. By the time you’re reading this, headlines will already have been inundated with stories about new iPhones and the Apple Watch, but the main attraction for me was the venue itself: Apple Park, an architectural manifestation of Steve Jobs, who, as Steven Levy reported for Wired, "was planning the future of Apple itself — a future beyond him and, ultimately, beyond any of us." Ahead of my trip, my curiosity swelled. What does the weight and magnitude of a facility that will design the next global culture shifting
LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
product like the iPhone feel like? What facility bears the product? All of this was on my mind as I wrapped up a large project of my own. Earlier this year, I set out to create Gear Patrol’s next headquarters — a humbler but certainly no less noble project. The goal: move our company into a new home within six months following an ambitious, perhaps preposterous, set of criteria that included amazing light, a prime location, cinematic aesthetic, modest budget and minimal time. No sane contractor would have agreed to the project, but as is the way at Gear Patrol, we said, "to hell with it," and took on the challenge ourselves. The venture has not been easy, but nearly six months of turbocharged seven-day work schedules later, I’m fortunate enough to be typing out this letter from my desk at Gear Patrol's new offices at the corner of Manhattan’s Madison Square Park. It feels a long way from the days when Ben and I were working on my living room couch jockeying for coffee and wi-fi. Yet, somehow, the spirit feels the same. The stuff that matters is here: people, sturdy laptops, coffee and, above all else, a fervent obsession with products. There are countless decisions and challenges that come with building an office, but the only way to succeed in this kind of project is by refusing to skimp on the principles of good design. To clarify, design isn't just a visual exercise. It’s also about planning intent, whether that’s an object, place or concept. Good design prioritizes principles and ideas into results. The better the design, the purer those principles are in the final product. Surprisingly, it turned out that the first step in designing a space that aligned with the Gear Patrol mission is light. Yup, light. Our previous office, located on the second floor of a low-rise building, was a decently fun space that we shared with another publication, Highsnobiety, but it was devoid of sunlight and chock-a-block with thoughtless, direc-
tional fluorescent lighting. The conditions made it great for escaping a fire but horrific for human beings. Over time, I saw the office extracting a mental price from our team no matter how much we upgraded or organized. In a recent survey by Future Workplace called "The Employee Experience," people ranked access and proximity to natural light as the number one workplace attribute — above cafeterias, fitness centers and premium perks like on-site childcare and free food. That's because light is more than just a perk, it’s a necessity. So that’s where we began. Since I’m only given space for so many words on this page, you’ll have to wait to read and see the tour of our new space on the web. We’re pretty pumped about it. At its core, it’s a facility designed by and for the team to use as a tool to help them embark on the next phase of our work in Product Journalism. Hopefully, the next time you come across something you enjoyed on Gear Patrol, including this issue — our first-ever focused on style and design — you’ll remember our prioritization of luminosity. Before I sign off, I wanted to take a moment to thank our amazing Editorial, Creative and Partnerships teams for bringing this particular issue to life while I was buried in matters of Wyzenbeek versus Martindale double rubs and air flow studies. The stories, guides and photography in this issue embody our ongoing obsession with the genesis, design and stylish sensibilities of products, as well as makers and places behind them.
Eric Yang Founder, Editor in Chief @hashtagyang | eyang@gearpatrol.com
P.S. For all you typography nerds out there, you’ll notice a tiny but momentous change for the magazine. We replaced our time-honored use of Gotham for Hoefler & Co.’s beautiful Ringside font.
INTRODUCING OUR NEW LINE OF WORKWEAR
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ERIC YANG @hashtagyang
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deputy photo editor associate editor
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issue seven contributors
issue seven contributors continued
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C r e a t i n g n ew h e i g h t s The new Montblanc 1858 Geosphere. Spirit of Mountain Exploration. montblanc.com/1858
OUR FAVORITE BRANDS UNIQUE COLLABORATIONS ALL AT THE GEAR PATROL STORE
The Gear Patrol Tote Whether it’s the gym, the office or a weekend at the beach, the Gear Patrol Tote has you covered. We built this bag with specific features tailored to our readers: a comfortable shoulder strap, an inside pocket to stow smaller items and a slightly oversized design — because let’s face it, there’s always more stuff on the way back. p r i c e $45
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Miir × Gear Patrol Vacuum Insulated Bottle - Black We teamed up with the good folks at Miir to design a special edition of their 23-ounce vacuum- insulated bottle. The stainless steel, powder-coated bottle features subtle laser etching and insulation that keeps your beverage tasting just right, no matter the weather. It's perfect for work, your commute or that next far-flung adventure.
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STYLE MADE SIMPLE.
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GEAR GUIDE MOTORING
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OUTDOORS
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FITNESS
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WATCHES
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STYLE
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TECH
HOME
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photo by chase pellerin
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MOTORING
Parts of the Whole by nick caruso ph o t o s b y h u n t e r d . k e ll e y i ll u s t r at i o n s b y j o e m c k e n d r y
It makes sense that a beautiful car would be made of beautiful parts. And while the smaller components of some luxury vehicles aren't aesthetic masterpieces in their own right, they're often interesting works of engineering (and proper middle fingers to design conventions). It's only a bonus, then, that the following elements are attached to uniquely desirable automobiles. Here's a handful of notable details that, in a sea of relatively homogenous vehicles, stand out as beacons of style and design.
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ISSUE SEVEN
Volvo Gearshift by Orrefors Leave it to a decidedly Swedish premium automaker to offer an attractive yet understated crystal shift knob on top-trim levels of select vehicles. Volvo has been killing it design-wise as of late, with gorgeous new models debuting in rapid succession. But its attention to detail doesn't stop at the sheet metal. Inside the spartan yet luxurious cabin of Volvo's XC60 T8 is a crown jewel handmade by the Swedish crystal makers Orrefors. The brilliantly clear, stubby shifter in this SUV is as pleasing to the eye as in the hand. There have been many superb shift knobs and levers in the history of the automobile, but as modern examples go, this one is king.
XC60 Inscription T8 Engine: supercharged and turbocharged 2.0-liter inline four; 9.2-kW-hr lithium-ion battery-powered electric motor Transmission: 8-speed automatic; all-wheel drive Horsepower: 313; 87; 400 combined Torque: 295 lb-ft; 177 lb-ft; 472 lb-ft combined Price: $57,695
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ISSUE SEVEN
Bentley 'Organ Stop' HVAC Vent Knobs
Koenigsegg Dihedral Doors
2019 Jaguar F-Type Coupe Tail End
Bentley's charming, stodgy British nature shines through in this detail. Instead of a small flip-style tab like you'd see in virtually any other car, these organ stop pulls open and close each HVAC vent, giving an otherwise plain dashboard a lot of blingy texture. They also harken back to a time when everything on a car — whether it was on a coach-built Bentley or a Model T — was handcrafted and manually operated.
Unconventional door hinges can be functionally necessary — there isn't room in the real world for a wide supercar's doors to swing outward — but sometimes their existence is nothing but ostentatious peacocking. The Koenigsegg dihedral doors are mostly the former, but with a tangible dose of the latter: they push outward horizontally then rotate around an axis, eventually settling at a 90-degree angle.
In an homage to the inimitable 1960s Jaguar E-Type, the F-Type is a modern miracle of retro design. It doesn't look hokey, as some other recent retro-inspired vehicles have, but instead offers a contemporary take on a very sexy shape. The rear end lifts to such a sharp point that it impinges on trunk space; the kind of impracticality only the most dedicated enthusiasts accept.
2019 Bentley Continental GT Engine: 6.0-liter, twin-turbocharged W12 Transmission: 8-speed dual-clutch Horsepower: 626 Torque: 664 ft-lbs Curb weight: 4,947 lbs Top speed: 207 mph 0-60: 3.6 seconds Price: $214,600
Koenigsegg Regera Engine: 5.0-liter twin-turbocharged V8; Three Electric Motors Transmission: Koenigsegg Direct Drive; rear-wheel drive Horsepower: 1,500 (V8 and electric motors combined) Torque: 1,475 lb-ft Curb weight: 3,510 lbs Top speed: 250+ mph (est.) 0-60: 2.8 seconds Price: $1.9 million (est.)
2019 Jaguar F-Type SVR Coupe Engine: 5.0-liter supercharged V8 Transmission: 8-speed automatic; all-wheel drive Horsepower: 575 Torque: 516 lb-ft Top speed: 200 mph 0-60: 3.5 seconds Price: $122,750 (base)
Lincoln 30-Way Perfect Position Seats
Second-Generation Ford GT Buttress
Alpina B6 Gran Coupe Wheels
Most automotive seats adjust four ways (they recline and slide forward and backward), while your dad's "nice" car may have an eight-way seat that also rises and lowers. Thanks to 11 separate air cushions, Lincoln's seats are customizable in 30 directions, meaning you can almost literally find the perfect position for your posterior (and back). Their articulation and appointments are second to none.
At once aerodynamically functional and outrageous, this buttress is unlike almost anything else you'll find on a road car. It connects the rear-wheel housing to the main cabin, giving what would otherwise be a relatively skeletal carbon-fiber body the appearance of having much more surface area. It also allows you to see straight through the side of the car. In addition to looking alien, the buttress diverts airflow, reduces drag and increases downforce.
Alpina-modified BMW cars are hyperbole on wheels. Faster than a streak, these cars are big and brash, but they tend to feature minimal bodywork and other additions. The wheels of the BMW Gran Coupe, however, are a dead giveaway that car has been magicked into something special. The 20-spoke rims look magnificent at speed, but standing still is when they truly shimmer.
2018 Lincoln Navigator Engine: 3.5-liter twin-turbocharged V6 Transmission: 10-speed automatic; four-wheel drive Horsepower: 450 Torque: 510 lb-ft Top speed: 115 mph 0-60: 5.5 seconds Towing capacity: 8,700 lbs Price: $72,555 (base)
Second-Generation Ford GT Engine: 3.5-liter twin-turbocharged V6 Transmission: 7-speed dual-clutch; rear-wheel drive Horsepower: 647 Torque: 550 lb-ft Curb weight: 3,354 lbs 0-60 mph: 2.8 seconds Top speed: 216 mph Price: ~$450,000 Total built: 1,000
Alpina B6 Gran Coupe Engine: 4.4-liter twin-turbocharged V8 Transmission: 8-speed automatic; all-wheel drive Horsepower: 591 Torque: 590 lb-ft Curb weight: 4780 lbs Top speed: 199 mph 0-60: 3.6 seconds Price: $124,000 (base)
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ISSUE SEVEN
What do you do when you’ve made a living designing everything from toothpicks to super-yacht interiors — and then get bored? Would creating your own motorcycle helmet designs be the obvious choice? It was for Nuno Henriques, more famously known on Instagram as @hellocousteau. Considering Henriques's career saw stints at such legendary design firms as Phoenix Design in Stuttgart, Germany, KiBiSi in Copenhagen, Denmark, and Rémi Tessier Design in Paris, France, it’s easy to see how Henriques became frustrated with the helmet market. "I was never a graphic designer, never a helmet designer. I was simply looking for a helmet for myself and couldn’t find anything I liked. They all seemed to be the same, there was no individuality." Since starting his Instagram handle @hel-
locousteau in 2016, Henriques has gained close to 20,000 followers and, on occasion, has received more than a hundred emails a day asking where to buy or order his helmets. But to date, only a couple of the renders from Henriques’s Instagram have made the jump to reality — one for AGV, one for HJC and a oneoff race suit for Spidi. Despite the widespread appeal of @hellocousteau designs, Henriques finds that bigger brands — the ones best equipped to bring the creative work to market — are sometimes the biggest hurdles. "People want change, people want different helmets, but the problem is inside the companies," Henriques says. "A lot of brands have contacted me to work with them, but if you do what they want, you lose your creativity and individuality. You just do
M OTORIN G
one more thing for them." Design ideas go into approval meetings with promising momentum only to suffer death by committee because "brands insist on making the same thing over and over," he says. Why not, then, go the custom route and get a skilled painter to bring the designs to life? That’s when his profits would skyrocket, after all. But Henriques isn’t in it for the money. In fact, he’s turned down requests from Hollywood stars, motorcycle racers and race car drivers — he doesn’t want his designs to come with some ultra-premium price tag. "The main idea behind @hellocousteau was not to make a lot of money, but to give people a choice," Henriques says. "That’s the reason I’m putting my designs on display: so someone can come and do something about it."
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Engineered Overkill b y b r ya n c a m p b e l l
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photos by henry phillips
It's a fact that commuting is hell, especially on two wheels. The daily rat race can take its toll, and your gear probably picks up most of its patina and battle scars as a result of the Monday-through-Friday nineto-five. Road debris and dirt, the beating sun, the pouring rain, traffic and possible falls and slides are all intensified by highway and traffic speeds. And so, gear must be overengineered for survival, which is where Kevin Murray, the founder and designer of Velomacchi, saw a gap in the market. The name Velomacchi comes from an amalgamation of the Italian words velocitĂ and macchina, translating to speed machine. The name, partly inspired by Murray's time in northern Italy, draws influences from the region's style, craftsmanship and approach to cycling, motorcycles and commuting; it makes even more sense when paired with the brand's motto: Built for Speed, Made to Last. A linen suit paired with brown leather dress shoes wouldn't stand up well to barreling down an open highway in rain and smog or worse, and neither would your precious belongings if stored in a bag made from pedestrian materials. As a motorcycle rider, Murray sought tough-asnails commuter gear out of necessity, but he couldn't find anything that met his standards. Nothing outside of military-spec packs and ballistic materials rose to the level of toughness he was looking for.
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Murray is a lifelong traveler. He globe-trotted as a kid and later got into adventure travel. "I'd be gone for a year. I'd work for a year, save up money and then travel for a year. This was long before cell phones; this was when traveler's cheques were cutting-edge technology," Murray says. He admits that "having lived on the road for years at a time" is what led him to a career in industrial design. "I would pick grapes in Mildura, Australia, so we could go climb at Mount Arapiles for four months or so. Then we'd save more money and I’d buy a plane ticket up to Nepal or India, climb Everest and do a bit of trekking around there. I was full nomad. I just worked and lived along the way." Eventually, Murray finished a degree in industrial design and joined The North Face in the '90s. He remained ever the globe-trotter, visiting Africa and Europe to explore new markets and test products. This was when the idea for Velomacchi, at first a pet project, was born. Murray left The North Face to start Syren Industrial Design, working with the USIA (Under Sea Industrial Apparel), which supplies SEAL Team operators, and the United States Coast Guard — organizations for which you would think there'd be nothing too tactical or too protective. "As I ran across really interesting stuff nobody else would touch, whether it was too expensive or whatnot, I would always kick it over to Velomacchi and experiment with new materials and processes. Once we commercialized it, we'd offer it to our military, public-safety gear or outdoor active lifestyle clients." During this time Murray gained an in-thetrenches view of factories and manufacturers. A factory’s ethics and environmental approach, he says, is "critical" for his brands. "When it came time to start Velomacchi I had my pick of the top manufacturers around the world — in terms of environmental and social-ethos concerns, as well as performance and quality. And I really didn't focus in on cost or price point at all. I saw such a huge opening within the luggage market. There was such a gulf between the stuff we were building at The North Face for extreme conditions and what was being made for luxury. And that's where we wanted to position ourselves," Murray says.
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ph o t o : v e l o ma c c h i
Over the past year, Velomacchi has established its name in the adventure- and commuter-motorcycling community with products from its Speedway collection, including leather motorcycle gloves, 28-, 35- and 40-liter fully waterproof bags, impact cases for laptops, and other sundries like a tool roll and tie-down straps. The eternal battle between function and form is alive and well and few know this better than Murray. When it came to the design of his bags, he kept the Built for Speed motto front and center. "If you've felt our bags and the material we use, the reason it's so substantive is because a regular bike bag will cavitate at speed," he says. "At twenty-five miles an hour, your bag or a strap flapping in the wind is not a big deal, but at a buck twenty-five, it’s a distraction and distractions at those speeds can be dangerous and deadly." Hence Velomacchi’s tri-point harness on the chest-straps take the weight off your back and shoulders and its straps tuck away or tie down. The adjusted weight distribution lessens rider fatigue and the hidden straps can’t repeatedly whip your sides.
ISSUE SEVEN
Early next year, Velomacchi will roll out its second line of bags and accompanying equipment to complement the brand's inaugural Speedway collection. Using what he's learned from the field testing and feedback of his first line, Murray designed the Urban Tactical collection to bring "military precision and industrial strength to the problems of carrying heavy loads at high speeds in extreme environments, while integrating a variety of battery packs and internal cabling to charge your devices." So whether your daily commute from hell drags you through the concrete jungle or through an actual one, Velomacchi is working on making sure your everyday carry and workday essentials get there with you, day in and day out, with engineered overkill sewn in with each stitch. Because if you can make it to work and back without falling apart, shouldn't your gear do the same?
to the right
Speedway Gloves $149 Speedway Backpack 28L $269 Custom Triumph Thruxton R $15,000
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