Features

All posts in “Features”

Top 15 Supercars to Look Forward to in 2019

2018 has been a superb year for sports cars and super cars. We saw the release of cars such as the BMW 8 Series, the Bugatti Divo, the McLaren Speedtail and the Lamborghini Aventador SV J. There is plenty more to look forward to in 2019 though.

We have collated a list of the 15 biggest new releases you should be looking forward to next year.

1. Koenigsegg Ragnarok

Koenigsegg have been working on a replacement for the Agera. We will get to see it in 2019 with a release pencilled in for the Geneva Motor Show 2019. Ragnarok is the rumoured name for the hypercar. It originates from Norse mythology, meaning a series of events which lead to the destruction of the cosmos. While we don’t expect that Koenigsegg’s Agera replacement will be quite so destructive, we do expect it to take the fight to cars like the Bugatti Chiron…

2. Aston Martin Valkyrie

Aston Martin are expected to start production of the Valkyrie this year. Their joint project with Red Bull racing was first announced in July 2016. Aston Martin are still teasing details of the Formula 1 inspired hypercar with customer deliveries due to begin in late 2019. We know that it will get a 1,000 hp 6.5-litre V12 engine with electric boost. It also gets a carbonfibre monocoque, bodywork and suspension inspired by Formula 1.

3. Mercedes-AMG ONE

The Mercedes-AMG One will hit owner’s driveway slightly sooner that it’s rival if rumours are to be believed. The One is expected to be delivered during the second quarter of 2019. Powered by a 1,000 hp combustion engine, a turbocharged 1.6-litre V6 petrol engine in this case, the One is also electrified. The Mercedes-AMG One should feel closer to a Formula 1 car as, in essence, its engine is very similar!

4. Lamborghini LB48H

Perhaps this might debut at the Geneva Motor Show 2019? Rumours suggest that this, as yet unnamed, Lamborghini project is intended to preview the technology that will underpin the replacement for the Lamborghini Aventador. That means hybrid technology. 63 copies of the Lamborghini LB48H will be up for grabs with rumours suggesting that the B48H will use a naturally aspirated V12 engine producing 789 hp coupled with a regenerating hybrid system producing an additional 49 hp.

5. Porsche Taycan

The Porsche Taycan is generating a huge amount of buzz on the internet. It has a waiting list of over a year already despite the fact that owners will need to wait until the Frankfurt Motor Show 2019 in September to get the official details. For now, we can say that Porsche plan to target the Tesla Model S with the Taycan. It is a crossover model, previewed by the Mission E Cross Turismo concept, which blends zero emissions electronic technology with the practicality of an estate.

6. Toyota Supra

We won’t have to wait long for the new Supra! It is due to be unveiled at the Detroit Motor Show 2019 during the first month of the year. The Supra is part of a joint collaboration with BMW. BMW’s new Z4 has already been revealed, the Supra remains mostly secret for now. Hopefully its only a matter of weeks before we can bring you some official detail!

7. Pininfarina Batista

Pininfarina recently received substantial investment from Indian Mahindra Group, allowing it the opportunity to forge a new identity as an EV specialist. The first part of it’s plan, before the onslaught of three electric SUV models, is to put together an electric hypercar, the Pininfarina Batista. The Batista will get its official unveil at the Geneva Motor Show 2019. The Italian design house has already announced that the Battista will get a 1,900 hp powertrain, sub-2.0 second 100 km/h sprint time and a 450 km range.

8. Corvette C8

American muscle fans will be braced to learn more about the Corvette C8. It had originally been expected to debut in Detroit but we understand that it is now more likely that Chevrolet will hold a stand alone event in the summer to blow the covers off. The C8 will depart from the front-engined set-up which has become the Corvette’s trademark. Very little is known, however, you can rest assured it will have a V8 engine and will likely target cars like the Porsche 911 Turbo.

9. Cayman GT4

Porsche are expected to release a new GT4 in 2019 too. The pocket supercar will retain the same formula as the last model. Bigger, 911 power plant coupled with a manual gearbox and around 430 hp. Rumours have also been circulating about a GT4 RS which might use the 4.0 litre straight six engine. Most sources suggest that a Geneva Motor Show 2019 release is most likely.

10. Ferrari 488 Successor

It seems only 10 minutes ago that we were reporting on the reveal of the Ferrari 488 GTB. Alas, the Pista has now been revealed and attention in Maranello should be focussed upon delivering the next generation model. Test mules have been spotted and rumours are already circulating that a Geneva Motor Show 2019 release might be in the offing. It should get the traditional Ferrari V8 with power at around 700 hp.

11. McLaren Sport Series

Another supercar that we know very little about, the McLaren 570S is due a successor this year. The 570S first hit the market in 2015. McLaren recently released the hardcore 600 LT and there are rumours that McLaren plans to replace the 570S next year. The rumours began at the start of this year when it was speculated that McLaren planned to use the Sport Series to release hybrid and autonomous technology into its model range. The rumours are not yet substantiated so we expect that the 570S replacement will happen later in the year. Still, keep your eyes pealed, the Sport Series is bound to be hugely desirable.

12. Aston Martin DBS GT Zagato

The Aston Martin DBS GT Zagato has already been announced. Back in September, Aston Martin confirmed that it would offer a version of its new DBS, fetled by coachwork legends Zagato. The catch is that in order to get one, you would need to order a DB4 GT Zagato Continuation! Just 19 of each will be built, which matched the production run of the original DB4 GT Zagato. To own one, you will need to put up £6 million. It remains to be seen what the DBS GT Zagato will look like.

13. Porsche 992 Cabriolet

The above render by Aksyonov Nikita shows what the Porsche 992 Cabriolet might look like. Porsche will almost certainly release the droptop version of its 911 next year. Customers will hope this will happen in time for a summer delivery date. It is possible that Porsche might choose the Geneva Motor Show 2019 as the official reveal. In any event, it will use a fabric drop top and share the 3.0-litre twin turbocharged flat six with the Coupe. In standard Carrera spec it will produce around 420 bhp, with the Carrera S getting 444 bhp.

14. Bentley Flying Spur

Bentley will follow the release of the Continental GT last year with its latest Flying Spur. During its centenary year, Bentley’s Flying Spur will move further away from the Continental GT line it was previously aligned to. While we expect that it will use a variation of the same platform, it is expected to get a personality of its own. It should get a full range of engine options with a V8 and W12 petrol unit, and a plug-in hybrid based around a V6 petrol. It will compete with the Rolls-Royce Ghost and Mercedes-Maybach S600.

15. BMW M8

The final car in our list has been anticipated ever since the BMW 8 Series was announced just under two years ago. Developed alongside the production Coupe, the M8 will get a larger lip spoiler, quad exhaust tailpipes and re-profiled bumpers compared to the M850i. It will use BMW’s 4.4-litre V8 together with a reveal currently anticipated for the Geneva Motor Show 2019.

December 29, 2018 / Comments Off

836

What to Drink this New Year’s Eve

New Year’s Eve is usually a night defined by shots and straight champagne, quickly followed by decisions that wouldn’t have been made on literally any other night of the year. We think it’s time to…

The 50 Best Menswear Shops in America

Last Updated January, 2018: This post has been updated with new picks for 2018.

Arbiters of cool — that’s what the menswear shop is at its best. Locations, brick and mortar and/or online, where your cache of style knowledge is expanded and challenged. Like the older cousin bestowing new knowledge on the sapling sartorialist, the good menswear shop is in the business of convivial education, brand discovery, style chutzpah experimentation.

And like memories of a favorite grade school teacher, a menswear shop holds distinct markers in time. I remember the search for Clae shoes, a rare commodity in Orange County in the ’00s, and the thrill of finding them at one dedicated sneaker shop in Costa Mesa. Or the discovery, at American Rag Cie’s outpost in Newport Beach, of clothing I’d never heard of — Comme des Garçon, Wings + Horns, rag & bone, A.P.C. — that seemed somehow better, if not because it boasted price tags I’d never dreamt of touching, than because the clothes offered something more intentionally and artfully created.

I never had an older brother. I never had a style mentor. And so, pivotal menswear shops swept me under their wing, took me into their corner and introduced me to brands doing something more in the field they occupied. It didn’t take one; education is never best from a single source. It took a series of revelatory moments, times when I’d step through the doors of a new or a trusted shop, and enter into a space that felt both familiar and dynamic, a store that embraced what I knew to be cool and yet introduced me to something more. That is the quality menswear shop, and the stores here listed create those significant sartorial moments. — Matthew Ankeny

Criteria for Inclusion: We stuck with notable, distinctive retail store that offers goods off the shelf (and/or online). Our compass in choice was that stores needed to have a distinct style aura that’s relevant to men’s style knowledge, and offered ready-made goods for purchase (rather than custom or tailored wares). We also casually stuck by the claim that, if you visited “X” city, it’s worth your time to stop in here — whether that be by distinctiveness of brand offering, ingenuity of store layout, or just because it’s a cool spot you wouldn’t want to miss.

The Best Menswear Shops in America

BILLY REID – Florence, AL
AMERICAN RAG CIE – Los Angeles, CA
COUNTY LTD. – Los Angeles, CA
DEUS EX MACHINA – Venice, CA
GENERAL ADMISSION – Venice, CA
IRON & RESIN GARAGE – Ventura, CA
STANDARD AND STRANGE – Oakland, CA
SELF EDGE – San Francisco, CA
UNIONMADE – San Francisco, CA
WASTELAND – San Francisco, CA
WELCOME STRANGER – San Francisco, CA
CANOE CLUB – Boulder, CO
ARMITAGE & MCMILLAN – Denver, CO
STEADBROOK – Denver, CO
TOPO DESIGNS – Denver, CO
SUPPLY & ADVISE – Miami, FL
SID MASHBURN – Atlanta, GA
LEATHER SOUL – Waikiki, HI
INDEPENDENCE – Chicago, IL
FRIEND – New Orleans, LA
BODEGA – Boston, MA
PORTLAND DRY GOODS CO. – Portland, ME
BEAUX BIENS – Rockport, ME
ASKOV FINLAYSON – Minneapolis, MN
BLACKBLUE – St. Paul, MN
MARTIN PATRICK 3 – Minneapolis, MN
PERSONA – Nashua, NH
IZZY MARTIN – Albuquerque, NM
THE ARMOURY – New York, NY
BEST MADE CO. – New York, NY
FRONT GENERAL STORE – Brooklyn, NY
GENTRY – Brooklyn, NY
J.CREW LUDLOW SHOP – New York, NY
NIKELAB – New York, NY
RALPH LAUREN MANSION – New York, NY
STEVEN ALAN – New York, NY
XHIBITION – Cleveland, OH
Abersons – Tulsa, OK
MACHUS – Portland, OR
REVOLVR – Bend, OR
THE WOODLANDS – Portland, OR
UBIQ – Philadelphia, PA
INDIGO AND COTTON – Charleston, SC
IMOGENE & WILLIE – Nashville, TN
HAMILTON SHIRTS – Houston, TX
MANREADY MERCANTILE – Houston, TX
NICE KICKS – Austin, TX
STAG PROVISIONS – Austin, TX
BASTILLE – Salt Lake City, UT
NEED SUPPLY CO. – Richmond, VA
FILSON – Seattle, WA
LIKELIHOOD – Seattle, WA
CONTEXT CLOTHING – Madison, WI

Billy Reid

Florence, AL | Est. 2004
For the Guy Who: Appreciates the design elements of a K.Swiss, Southern dandyism and fine leather.
Brands: Billy Reid

114 N. Court St., Florence, AL 35630 ⇱ | (877) 757-3934 | billyreid.com

American Rag Cie

Los Angeles, CA | Est. 1985
For the Guy Who: Likes finding vintage classics alongside new and unexpected designers.
Brands: Billykirk, Fadeless, BLK DNM, Obey

150 S. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90036 ⇱ | (323) 935-3154 | americanrag.com

County Ltd.

Los Angeles, CA | Est. 2017
For the Guy Who: Loves simple, timeless design.
Brands: Lady White Co., Auralee, The Superior Labor, H.W. Dog & Co.

1837 Hyperion Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90027 ⇱ | (323) 741-8337
| countyltd.com

Deus Ex Machina

Venice, CA | Est. 2012
For the Guy Who: Needs new clothes, but doesn’t want to “shop” — this is a custom-made-motorcycle, hand-shaped-surfboard-display space, with some surf and casual apparel.
Brands: Thrux Lawrence, Baxter of California, Biltwell

1001 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291 ⇱ | (888) 515-3387 | deuscustoms.com

The 27 Best Boots for Every Occasion

Nine types of boots, three choices each. Hop to it. Read the Story

General Admission

Venice, California | Est. 2015
For the Guy Who: Who likes to blend surf, skate and contemporary menswear.
Brands: Brain Dead, Fukt, Levi’s Made and Crafted, Outerknown, Our Legacy

52 Brooks Ave, Venice, CA 90291 ⇱ | (310) 399-1051 | generaladmission.us

Iron & Resin Garage

Ventura, CA | Est. 2013
For the Guy Who: Enjoys a straightforward blend of high style with skate and surf culture.
Brands: Iron & Resin

324 E. Main St., Ventura, CA 93001 ⇱ | (805) 643-0737 | ironandresin.com

Standard and Strange

Oakland, CA | Est. 2012
For the Guy Who: Bases his wardrobe in quality denim and leather boots.
Brands: Shockoe Atelier, OrSlow, Alden, Red Wing

5010 Telegraph Avenue, Oakland, CA 94609 ⇱ | (510) 373-9696 | standardandstrange.com

Self Edge

San Francisco, CA | Est. 2006
For the Guy Who: Appreciates really, really, really good denim.
Brands: Iron Heart, The Strike Gold, 3Sixteen, The Flat Head

714 VALENCIA ST., SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94110 ⇱ | (415) 558-0658 | selfedge.com

Unionmade

San Francisco, CA | Est. 2009
For the Guy Who: Needs to stock up on solid wardrobe basics and who’ll spend a bit more for an exclusive collaboration.
Brands: Alden, Golden Bear, Gitman Bros., Journal Standard

493 Sanchez St., San Francisco, CA 94114 ⇱ | (415) 861-3373 | unionmadegoods.com

Wasteland

San Francisco, CA | Est. 1985
For the Guy Who: Enjoys vintage pieces and the art of the search.
Brands: Ever changing

1660 Haight St., San Francisco, CA 94117 ⇱ | (415) 863-3150 | shopwasteland.com

Welcome Stranger

San Francisco, CA | Est. 2010
For the Guy Who: Seeks top-quality, hard-to-find brands, priced accordingly.
Brands: Rag & Bone, Topo Designs, Welcome Stranger, Gant

460 Gough St., San Francisco, CA 94102 ⇱ | (415) 864-2079 | welcomestranger.com

Canoe Club

Boulder, CO | Est. 2017
For the Guy Who: Loves rugged Americana with a heavy dose of Japanese influence.
Brands: Filson, RRL, Kapital, Remi Relief

777 Pearl Street, Boulder, CO 80302 ⇱ | (720) 282-3114 | shopcanoeclub.com

Armitage & McMillan

Denver, CO | Est. 2014
For the Guy Who: Wants New York urban and Rocky Mountains natural all in one place.
Brands: The Brooklyn Circus, BillyKirk, FairEnds, Saturdays Surf NYC

1550 Platte St., Suite D, Denver, CO 80202 ⇱ | (303) 284-6222 | armitageandmcmillan.com

Great Duffles and Weekenders

Leather, canvas and much more, these are the most functional and stylish bags at any budget. All ready for your next getaway. Read the Story

Steadbrook

Denver, CO | Est. 2013
For the Guy Who: Wants high fashion alongside a dose of Western functionality and community.
Brands: Steadbrook, Carhartt, Benny Gold, Norse Projects

46 S. Broadway, Denver, CO 80204 ⇱ | (720) 441-1891 | steadbrook.com

Topo Designs

Denver, CO | Est. 2013
For the Guy Who: Is going on his first or 1,000th day hike and wants to look the part.
Brands: Topo Designs, OYO, Snow Peak, MSR

2500 Larimer St., Denver, CO 80205 ⇱ | (303) 954-8420 | topodesigns.com

Supply & Advise

Miami, FL | Est. 2015
For the Guy Who: Loves Americana-inspired apparel and enjoys clothing that is stylish yet still comfortable.
Brands: Alex Mill, Jungmaven, Gant, Levi’s, Quoddy, Tanner Goods

223 SE. 1st St., Miami, FL 33131 ⇱ | (305) 960-2043 | supplyandadvise.com

Essential Everyday Backpacks

These are the best backpacks to carry everywhere, every day. Read the Story

Leather Soul

Waikiki, HI | Est. 2004
For the Guy Who: Relishes a fantastic selection of fine footwear.
Brands: Alden, John Lobb, Briefing, Paraboot

2233 Kalakaua Ave. #301, Honolulu, HI, 96815 ⇱ | (808) 922-0777 | leathersoul.com

Independence

Chicago, IL | Est. 2012
For the Guy Who: Needs to try on Oak Street boots before they make the wise purchase (and then buy some complementary apparel).
Brands: Oak Street Bootmakers, Gitman Bros., Apolis

47 E. Oak St., Chicago, IL 60611 ⇱ | (312) 675-2105 | independence-chicago.com

Friend

New Orleans, LA | Est. 2012
For the Guy Who: Enjoys high-end, casual sportswear (you dig?) and boardshorts.
Brands: Corridor, Cuisse de Grenouille, Saturdays Surf NYC

2115 Magazine St., New Orleans, LA 70130 ⇱ | (504) 218-4214 | friendneworleans.com

Overshirts to Tackle Cool Weather

An ideal transitional layer, the overshirt will keep you warm on chilly evenings and crisp mornings. Read the Story

Bodega

Boston, MA | Est. 2006
For the Guy Who: Collects sneakers and loves streetwear.
Brands: Adidas, New Balance, Acronym, Carhartt W.I.P.

6 Clearway St. Boston, MA 02115 ⇱ | shop.bdgastore.com

Portland Dry Goods Co.

Portland, ME | Est. 2011
For the Guy Who: Wants a modern, outdoors-inspired look without donning technical nylon or growing a Civil War beard.
Brands: Canada Goose, Battenwear, Engineered Garments, Imogene + Willie

237 Commercial St., Portland, ME 04101 ⇱ | (207) 699-5575 | seawallshop.com

Beaux Biens

Rockport, ME | Est. 2016
For the Guy Who: Appreciates the small details in wardrobe staples.
Brands: Maine Mountain Moccasin, Tender Co., Velva Sheen, Battenwear

6 Dock Square, Rockport, ME, 01966 ⇱ | (978) 309-5645 | beauxbiens.com

Askov Finlayson

Minneapolis, MN | Est. 2011
For the Guy Who: Enjoys adventuring outdoors as much as he likes looking good while doing it.
Brands: Askov Finayson, Fjällräven, Frost River, Snow Peak, Sanborn Canoe Company

204 1st St. N., Minneapolis, MN 55401 ⇱ | (612) 206-3925 | askovfinlayson.com

BlackBlue

St. Paul, MN | Est. 2009
For the Guy Who: Likes classic clothing made from time-tested materials (read: leather and denim).
Brands: Gitman Bros., JW Hulme, Tellason, Redwing, Levi’s

614 Selby Ave., St. Paul, MN 55102 ⇱ | (651) 260-5340 | blkblu.com

Martin Patrick 3

Minneapolis, MN | Est. 2005
For the Guy Who: Likes to buy top-notch clothes, shoes and accessories all in one spot.
Brands: Jack Spade, Malin + Goetz, Naked & Famous, Rag & Bone

212 3rd Ave. N., #106, Minneapolis, MN 55401 ⇱ | (612) 746-5329 | martinpatrick3.com

Persona

Nashua, NH | Est. 2008
For the Guy Who: Wants a touch of modern in rural New England.
Brands: 10.Deep, Gourmet, Penfield, Saucony

122 Main St., Nashua, NH 03062 ⇱ | (603) 886-2707 | shop-persona.com

Izzy Martin

Albuquerque, NM | Est. 2011
For the Guy Who: Wants a solid collection of brands that offer timeless staples for every man.
Brands: Gitman Vintage, Levi’s, Pendleton, The Hill-Side

103 Amherst Dr SE, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87106 ⇱ | (505) 235-9493 | izzymartin.com

The Armoury

New York, NY | Est. 2010
For the Guy Who: Appreciates the craftsmanship of a classic suit, an Italian tie and benchmade shoes.
Brands: Ascot Chang, Carmina, Drake’s, Ring Jacket

168 Duane Street, New York, NY 10013 ⇱ | (646) 613-7613 | thearmoury.com

Best Made Co.

New York, NY | Est. 2009
For the Guy Who: Likes drinking out of enamelware and carrying a hatchet, even when he’s not camping. (Note: The company opened a second retail location in Los Angeles, California.)
Brands: Best Made Co.

36 White St., New York, NY 10013 ⇱ | (646) 478-7092 | bestmadeco.com

Luxury Bomber Jackets

The bomber jacket has transcended its utilitarian roots in recent years with brands producing coats made from cashmere, suede and shearling. Read the Story

Front General Store

Brooklyn, NY | Est. 2011
For the Guy Who: Seeks exclusivity and diversity — it’s a Japanese-owned store in Dumbo boasting a trove of vintage Americana.
Brands: Members Only, Sunrock, Pendleton

143 Front St., Brooklyn, NY 11201 ⇱ | (347) 693-5328 | frontgeneralstore.com

J.Crew Ludlow Shop

New York, NY | Est. 2008
For the Guy Who: Needs a reliable, tailored suit, for a large market price.
Brands: J.Crew

50 Hudson St., New York, NY 10013 ⇱ | (212) 587-3139 | jcrew.com

NikeLab

New York, NY | Est. 2014
For the Guy Who: Understands the worth of a concept store reimagining classic innovations.
Brands: Nike, Nike Collaborations

21 Mercer St., New York, NY 10013 ⇱ | (212) 226-5433 | nikelab.com

The Best Natural Dyed Tees

Natural-dyed shirts have range of subtle colors that synthetic-dyed shirts can’t match. Here are the brands offering great natural-dyed tees. Read the Story

Ralph Lauren Mansion

New York, NY | Est. 1986
For the Guy Who: Wants a royal Americana treatment in a 19th-century New York mansion.
Brands: Polo Ralph Lauren

867 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10021 ⇱ | (212) 606-2100 | ralphlauren.com

Steven Alan

New York, NY | Est. 1997
For the Guy Who: Likes to have the hottest new thing, before it’s the hottest new thing.
Brands: Steven Alan, Engineered Garments, Wings+Horns, New Balance

103 Franklin St., New York, NY 10013 ⇱ | (212) 343-0692 | stevenalan.com

Xhibition

Cleveland, OH | Est. 2014
For the Guy Who: Doesn’t shy from dropping cash for the biggest brands and embraces stepping into a futuristic, sensory experience of a shop to get them.
Brands: Head Porter, Asics, Y-3, Alexander Wang

2068 W. 25th St., Cleveland, OH 44113 ⇱ | (216) 298-4770 | xhibition.com

Abersons

Tulsa, OK | Est. 1974
For the Guy Who: Is looking for all the Italian luxury in one place.
Brands: Boglioli, Brunello Cucinelli, Massimo Alba, Lardini

3509 S. Peoria, Tulsa, OK, 74105⇱ | (918) 742-7335 | abersonstyle.com

Machus

Portland, OR | Est. 2011
For the Guy Who: Is seeking hard-to-find designers in a friendly, helpful location.
Brands: Field Notes, DSPTCH, Adidas X Kanye West

532 E. Burnside St., Portland, OR 97214 ⇱ | (503) 206-8626 | machusonline.com

Revolvr

Bend, OR | Est. 2013
For the Guy Who: Just took his last run of the day at Mt. Bachelor and is looking for something comfortable and stylish to hit the apres scene.
Brands: Electric, Harry’s Shaving, Obey, Scotch & Soda, Stance Socks

945 NW. Wall St., Bend, OR 97701 ⇱ | (541) 647-2627 | revolvrmens.com

The Woodlands

Portland, OR | Est. 2011
For the Guy Who: Is an urban lumberjack in a city whose sports teams are the Trailblazers, Timbers and Ducks.
Brands: Carhartt, Rancourt & Co., The Hill-Side, A Kind of Guise

1308 W. Burnside St., Portland, OR 97209 ⇱ | (503) 222-2774 | tannergoods.com

Style Basics for Men

Basics like t-shirts, sweatshirts and jeans make up the foundation of any man’s wardrobe. Here are the best basics to buy now. Read the Story

UBIQ

Philadelphia, PA | Est. Date 2001
For the Guy Who: Looking for exclusive sneakers and the streetwear to match.
Brands: Adidas Originals, Asics, Clae, Danner, Native, New Balance, Nike

1509 Walnut Street Philadelphia, PA 19102 ⇱ | (215) 988-0194 | ubiqlife.com

Indigo and Cotton

Charleston, SC | Est. 2011
For the Guy Who: Wants a hint of Southern style, but not all of it.
Brands: Jungmaven, Billykirk, Shinola, Imogene & Willie, Velva Sheen

79 Cannon St., Charleston, SC 29403 ⇱ | (843) 718-2980 | indigoandcotton.com

Imogene & Willie

Nashville, TN | Est. 2009
For the Guy Who: Wants to buy old school, raw denim from an old school, raw shop built in a gas station garage.
Brands: Imogene & Willie, George Kelly, White’s Boots, Olive & Sinclair

2601 12th Ave. S., Nashville, TN 37204 ⇱ | (615) 292-5005 | imogeneandwillie.com

Hamilton Shirts

Houston, TX | Est. 1883
For the Guy Who: Is in pursuit of classic Texan shirts from an iconic brand.
Brands: Hamilton

5700 Richmond Ave., Houston, Texas 77057 ⇱ | (713) 264-8800 | hamiltonshirts.com

Manready Mercantile

Houston, TX | Est. 2012
For the Guy Who: Enjoys pampering himself with the best men’s grooming products available.
Brands: Manready Mercantile, D.S. & Durga, Portland General Store, Field Notes, Chippewa

321 W. 19th St., Houston, TX 77008 ⇱ | (800) 554-9352 | manready.com

The Best Keychain Upgrades for Men

The crossroads of functional and stylish. Read the Story

Nice Kicks

Austin, TX | Est. 2006
For the Guy Who: Knows he wants a new, rare, exclusive sneaker — or just wants to browse an impressive selection.
Brands: Nike, Adidas, Stussy, Vans

2815B Guadalupe St., Austin, TX 78705 ⇱ | (512) 320-8100 | nicekicks.com

Stag Provisions

Austin, TX | Est. 2009
For the Guy Who: Is seeking out a little bit of everything and is in search of a man’s modern-day general store.
Brands: Baxter, Herschel Supply Co., Juniper Ridge, Tsovet, Jack Spade

1423 S. Congress Ave., Austin, TX 78704 ⇱ | (512) 373-7824 | stagprovisions.com

Bastille

Salt Lake City, UT | Est. 1997
For the Guy Who: Wants a tightly curated selection of forward-thinking brands.
Brands: A.P.C., John Elliott, Engineered Garments, Nudie Jeans

79 S. Rio Grande Street, Salt Lake City, UT 84101 ⇱ | (801) 456-0330 | shopbastille.com

Need Supply Co.

Richmond, VA | Est. 2008
For the Guy Who: Keeps it clean with solid basic shirts and tees, modern footwear and unique accessories.
Brands: A Kind of Guise, Common Projects, Outerknown, Naked and Famous

3100 W. Cary St., Richmond, VA 23221 ⇱ | (804) 355-4383 | needsupply.com

Filson

Seattle, WA | Est. 1998
For the Guy Who: Appreciates traditional, rainy-season craftsmanship and lives a classy, outdoorsman lifestyle.
Brands: Filson

1555 4th Ave. S., Seattle, WA 98134 ⇱ | (206) 622-3147 | filson.com

Likelihood

Seattle, WA | Est. 2015
For the Guy Who: Has a footwear collection larger than most people’s wardrobes.
Brands: Adidas, New Balance, Norse Projects, Puma, Seavees

1101 E. Union St., Seattle, WA 98122 ⇱ | (206) 257-0577 | shoplikelihood.com

Context Clothing

Madison, WI | Est. 2005
For the Guy Who: Finds himself digging through old barns and refinishing rusty metal tables on the weekends.
Brands: Duckworth, First Settlement Goods, Oak Street Bootmakers, Post Overalls

113 King St., Madison, WI 53703 ⇱ | (608) 250-0113 | contextclothing.com

12 of the Most Beautiful Menswear Shops Around the World

From Tokyo to Joburg and back again. Read the Story

December 28, 2018 / Comments Off

1234

Aesop Made the Best Grooming Product of 2018

By Adam Hurly

Dec 19, 2018

Having combination skin — that is, a face that’s oily in some places but dry in others — won’t exactly kill you. It’s not really an affliction so much as it is a state of being. And that might explain why even though the dermatological type is the most common kind of skin out there, there aren’t many good systems to treat it.

Advertisement – Continue Reading Below

Gear Patrol

But in April, Aesop released just such a system when its chemists unveiled In Two Minds. The range is designed to address the complexity of treating both types of skin at once, and to bring the skin to a healthy equilibrium in three simple steps: cleansing, toning and moisturizing.

It took Watkinson and her Melbourne-based team three years to perfect the formulas.

“Each of the products works together to gently cleanse combination skin, normalize sebum production, soothe irritation and provide lightweight hydration without overburdening the skin,” says Dr. Rebecca Watkinson, Aesop’s innovation and research manager.

Chandler Bondurant

Advertisement – Continue Reading Below

It took Watkinson and her Melbourne-based team three years to perfect the formulas, all of which use of witch hazel — an ingredient commonly used in toners. They focused in particular on getting the cleanser, which doubles as a gentle chemical exfoliant, just right.

“Cleansing is an important first step in caring for combination skin. It is crucial to use a mild cleanser that does not strip or aggravate the skin,” Watkinson says. “Our In Two Minds Cleanser is a gel-based cleanser containing salicylic acid and offers gentle yet thorough cleansing, removing excess sebum without aggravation.”

Other ingredients that pop up in each product, like chamomile and lavender, hydrate and calm the skin without adding oily buildup. The toner balances the skin’s pH levels and helps clear away any residue the cleanser might leave behind, getting the skin ready for the herbaceous hydrator. Aesop suggests using just two pumps of this lotion as a finishing step to protect the skin against age-accelerating environmental wear.

And while the idea of a three-step regimen for combination skin isn’t exactly new, until now it’s more or less required hunting the aisles of a drugstore for three separate products — or paying a dermatologist to recommend them for you. In Two Minds makes it easy to get an effective, end-to-end system all in one place.

Advertisement – Continue Reading Below

Cleanse: Gel-based formula cleanses without drying
Tone: Mild astringent soothes the skin and removes impurities
Moisturize: Lightweight lotion absorbs quickly

Buy Now: $128

This story is part of the GP100, Gear Patrol’s annual index of the 100 best products of the year. To see the full list of products or read this story in print, check out Gear Patrol Magazine: Issue Eight, available now at the Gear Patrol Store.

December 19, 2018 / Comments Off

387

For Mountain Hardwear’s Most Advanced Collection Yet, It Looked to Its Past

As we took the next few steps upwards, our breath visible under the light of our headlamps, we caught our first glimpse of the summit. Still some 1,600 feet below the crest of Pico de Orizaba, the highest mountain in Mexico, we needed to pace ourselves. Stopping briefly for water, we stared up as first light reached the Jamapa Glacier, an icy 35-degree slope laden with crevasses. A good reminder of how small we are.

Hours earlier, we started the summit push from our high camp just after 2 AM and had just passed the crux of the climb, a slick section called the Labyrinth. We had endured freezing rain and high winds for nearly five hours and 3,000 feet of slowly marching upward. Orizaba, at 18,491 feet, is the third highest mountain in North America, and a challenge for even the hardy. The six of us had gathered two days earlier at the rental car office at the airport, beaming with excitement. A group of friends from all over the US, we came together to tick a bucket list climb and test some of Mountain Hardwear’s newest products.

Mountain Hardwear introduced an entirely new line of sustainable technologies in December, by far its most environmentally responsible collection in the company’s 25-year history. Before the trip, I had a chance to sit down with the design team to learn more about the sourcing and history behind the new Exposure/2 collection. Mountain Hardwear was inspired by a belief that sustainability is opportunity, not just an obligation. From product designers all the way up to the company’s president, the team bought into the idea and invested in research, design and testing of new recycled materials, solution dyes and sustainable waterproofing.

Mountain Hardwear’s commitment to sustainable technologies runs the gamut, from apparel, to packs and tents. Every one of its major upcoming products launches has sustainability baked in, including the Exposure/2 collection — which includes a flashy pair of bibs and a jacket. This combo was made possible through a rekindled partnership with materials developer Gore-Tex.

The collection is made with a three-layer Gore-Tex Pro Shell fabric that’s waterproof, windproof and breathable. Both the jacket and bibs have an improved ability to stretch, striking a balance between comfort and consistent weather protection, perfect for extended activities like summiting Orizaba with extreme weather. The jackets were designed for the demands of backcountry skiers, mountaineers, alpinists, guides and serious outdoor enthusiasts.

Despite being undeniably burly and durable, the most impressive parts of the Exposure/2 Pro shell and bib are hard to spot with the human eye. In one colorway that references the brand’s 1993 color palette, the jacket and bib feature solution-dyed fibers instead of the traditional dying process, in which individual strands of yarn are dyed using a large volume of water and chemicals. Solution dyeing involves mixing pigment directly into the plastic pellets before it is extruded into yarns. The output is a deep, permanently colored fiber that can be woven into fabrics without wasted water or dyes.

The solution-dye process that Mountain Hardwear chose to utilize requires 89% less water, 63% fewer chemicals and generates 60% fewer CO2 emissions than traditional dyeing while creating colors that last longer. After Mountain Hardwear ran the numbers, the process was an obvious choice. The Exposure/2 collection features some colorways that are not solution dyed and instead are made using 100% recycled nylon, further reducing the environmental footprint of the collection.

“The incorporation of recycled and solution dyed textiles has the potential to significantly lower the environmental impact of making Gore-Tex garments,” said Bernhard Kiehl, Gore Fabrics Sustainability Leader. “Our Life Cycle Analysis indicated that a long and useful life is the single most important factor in measuring sustainability. Solution dyeing partially addresses this finding, as the process produces improved durability and lasting color.”

Mountain Hardwear’s push for sustainability goes further with the REI-exclusive Exposure/2 Paclite Pullover styles where the brand introduces a Durable Water Repellant (DWR) treatment free of perfluorinated compounds. This technology, known as C0 DWR, eliminates the persistent toxin associated with the carbon chemistry of C8 or C6 DWR, which have long been industry standards. “As a garment’s first line of defense against precipitation, DWR treatments are essential to the performance of high-quality outerwear,” said Steve Adams, Mountain Hardwear’s Senior Outerwear Product Line Manager. “However, until recently, those benefits came with a significant environmental cost: the use of perfluorinated compounds, inorganic substances that accumulate in the environment. By eliminating PFCs, we’re delivering performance without the environmental impact.”

On the five day trip to Mexico, we had the opportunity to test prototypes of products coming down the pipeline in spring 2019, including new Trango tents, Alpine Light and Scrambler packs and Phantom sleeping bags. Curious how these new, environmentally responsible materials would hold up, we asked Peter Valles, VP of Design and Brand. “These are some of the newest materials available to the market. We simply chose to work with the most sustainable options available to us, from Bluesign-approved, recycled and solution-dyed fabrics to tent materials made without toxic flame retardants.”

As part of Mountain Hardwear’s redesign of its entire equipment line, the brand has taken a stand against the use of fire-retardant chemicals in tents, choosing not to apply toxic compounds to all of its shelters, including base camp, expedition and backpacking tents. “The tent standard that necessitates the use of fire retardant chemicals — which are often highly toxic — is based on a rule developed to protect against highly flammable, paraffin-coated cotton circus tents decades ago” explained Joe Vernachio, Mountain Hardwear’s president. “We’re challenging this outdated standard in the interest of sustainability and our consumer’s health. We are eliminating its use from all future Mountain Hardwear tents.”

The launch of Exposure/2 also celebrates the 25th anniversary of Mountain Hardwear and is a homage to the original Exposure jacket, which launched 25 years ago. While the collection embraces the heritage of Mountain Hardwear, it is mostly focused on the future. With this new line, the brand shows its focus on the emerging generation of climbers who appreciate performance and style, combined with responsible ethics in sourcing and manufacturing. “Our products will always be technically focused, with a fresh and youthful spirit,” said Steve Adams.

Driven by a philosophy of environmental optimism, the team designed the Exposure/2 collection with some of the most sustainable fabrics and dyes available. The new collection references the 1993 color palette with bold and fun colorways. For those looking for a high-performance and responsibly made shell for alpine environments, the Exposure/2 is your top choice.

In the end, whiteout conditions on the Jamapa Glacier and nausea for a couple members of the team turned us around. The summit of Orizaba, a monolith of rock and ice, will have to wait for another day. With cold hands and wet toes, we carefully descended the same path we had come. This moment will stick with me. I’ll use it as a reminder to respect the earth – it’s the only one we have.

Exposure/2 Gore-Tex Pro Jacket by Mountain Hardwear $650

Exposure/2 Gore-Tex Pro Bib by Mountain Hardwear $550

Exposure/2 Gore-Tex Active Jacket by Mountain Hardwear $425

Exposure/2 Gore-Tex Paclite Stretch Pullover by Mountain Hardwear $275

Note: Purchasing products through our links may earn us a portion of the sale, which supports our editorial team’s mission. Learn more here.

December 14, 2018 / Comments Off

411

2019 Porsche Macan S Review

As a lover of sports cars I have a huge admiration of Porsche and their two door sports cars. The Boxster and Cayman have mid-engined poise and balance like noting else in the segment and don’t even get me started on the brilliance of every 911 in the range from the T, to the GTS to the unhinged GT models. Porsche define sports cars and set an example to the rest on how things should be done.

But now there are far more Porsche models on offer. When the Cayenne launched way back when I was a wee little lad, the world thought that the Germans had gone mad. When the Panamera launched the world thought the designers had gone blind. Then followed the Macan, a car that was an instant hit, because the world had gone barmy and suddenly everyone wanted an SUV to clog up narrow city streets and school drop off zones.

Porsche Macan Mallorca Zaid Hamid

This epidemic has continued and now we live in a world where Porsche sells more Macans than any other model. This is great for two simple reasons. The Macan is brilliant and selling shed loads of Macans, Panameras and Cayennes means that Porsche can reinvest profits into the cars that the rest of the world and I love them for – the bonkers things such as the GT2 RS et al.

So the Macan is the bread winner, the golden child, the cash cow if you will – this makes it extremely important. It must be good and for this reason I flew to Mallorca to see what was what. Initial impressions are great – my buddy Philipp Rupprecht shot the official press pictures of the updated Macan and it looked great under the studio lights. The front end is not wildly different to the first gen car. The rear is a similar story, the most notable change being the lightsaber rear light beam that is now the norm on the buttocks of every Porsche. I liked the look of the old car, I love the look of the new one.

Enough of the styling, what this this new car like on the road? Porsche boldly opens the press materials with the statement that the new Macan is ‘the sports car in its segment’. The seating position immediately suggests that they are on to something – you sit nice and low and the steering wheel comes to meet you. It’s a little bizarre, but it is positive in a car that weighs 2,500 kilograms. The drivetrain continues the sporty connotations with a 3.0-litre petrol, twin-scroll turbocharged V6 nestled under the bonnet on the Macan S – this same unit can be found in the Cayenne and Panamera. This is, of course, linked to Porsche’s PDK which we all know to be sublime. Being an SUV, the power is fed to all four wheels via the PTM all-wheel drive system.

With 354 horsepower the Macan S is spritely for a midsized SUV sprinting to 100km/h in 5.1 seconds and ploughing onto a top speed of 225km/h. What is interesting is how the Macan S is able to be driven with gusto on twisty roads and manage its weight very well. The car I was driving was fitted with the Sport Chrono package meaning that features the drive mode switch. In Sport and Sport+ the air suspension is stiffened to fight body roll and works with the Porsche Stability Management systems to make this the most dynamically capable Macan yet. Furthermore, new engine mounts manage the movement of the engine.

There is a smidgen of feedback from the steering wheel, a feat for such a car, there is always a sense that you can feel what the chassis is doing beneath you. Driving the car for several hours a few things instantly became clear. The car is happy to be driven in anger and handles well for a car of this nature, but more importantly, it is a sublime and comfortable car to drive at a more leisurely pace. That being said, the sound of the engine in the upper half of the rev range is disappointing. It does not sound smooth, to the extent that it could pass as a diesel to the untrained ear.

The aforementioned air suspension irons out bumps and craters as if they were filled with marshmallow and it is extremely quiet and gentle on highway cruises. This is where Macans will almost entirely spend their lives – going to the supermarket, dropping children to and from schools and occasionally doing a longer drive on a long weekend or vacation.

For tasks such as these the Macan shines. The interior, complete with Panamera like screen and displays is fantastic with fabulous materials and build quality. There is a small army of driver aids and tech and the updated styling, in and out will be a huge success. The Macan S is sure to still be the segment leader.

December 10, 2018 / Comments Off

552

One Man in Colorado Is Keeping the Dying Art of Painting Ski Trail Maps Alive

The name “James Niehues” may not strike home immediately, but if you’re a skier, you’ve undoubtedly held his work. Niehues has painted roughly 255 ski trail maps, for 175 different resorts, including some of North America’s most iconic slopes. To the west: Alta, Big Sky, Park City, Heavenly, Mammoth, Snowbird, Squaw Valley, Sun Valley, Telluride, Taos and Vail all have Niehues’s name on their trail map. To the east: Killington, Mt. Snow, Okemo, Smugglers Notch, Stowe, Stratton, Sugarloaf, Sunapee and Sunday River.

For resorts, having Niehues’s signature on their trail map gives them clout and prestige. It’s like having Jimmy Chin film a mountaineering documentary or having Russell James shoot a cover photo. Now 72, Niehues didn’t start painting trail maps until after his 40th birthday. As for how he got into the industry, it started with being in the right place at the right time.

In 1988, after years working in several ad agencies, a print shop and even working as a courtroom illustrator, Niehues was looking to change careers. He had moved to Denver and, because he admired Bill C. Brown’s work, he reached out to him. Brown was also living in Denver. As the protégé of Hal Shelton (the original trail map painter, in the ’60s), Brown had been painting trail maps since the ’70s. And by the late ’80s, after nearly two decades in the industry, he was trying to pursue other passions. When Niehues approached him, Brown agreed to see his illustrations.

When they met, Brown had already been hired by Winter Park Resort to paint the backside of Mary Jane. And he had time to do it, so he let Niehues have a go. “The thought was if [mine] didn’t pass, he could still go ahead and do it,” says Niehues. “So I did it, spent about a month at it, and when he showed it to the client they never knew that Bill hadn’t done it. And then he brought it back to me and I signed it. That was my first illustration.”

To properly photograph a mountain, for mapping purposes, Niehues needs to get 2,000 feet above the summit. At this height he can see “into the trees” instead of just looking across to the horizon.

On any project, Niehues requires aerial photos of the mountain. “These photographs are for information, not for composition or quality,” says Niehues. “So anybody can shoot them.” Niehues takes a lot of these photos himself. When it’s not him, he prefers to work with amateurs who aren’t after that one Chris Burkard-like moment of magic. There have been numerous times, he says, where the photos had to be reshot because they didn’t capture the right information.

Can you guess the unlabeled mountains in the header image and the image above? (answers at bottom of post)

Can you guess the unlabeled mountains in this post? (answers at bottom)

To properly photograph a mountain, for mapping purposes, Niehues needs to get 2,000 feet above the summit. At this height he can see “into the trees” instead of just looking across to the horizon. Niehues takes a sweep at this elevation, snapping about 20 photos. He’ll then drop down to 1,000 to take another sweep, and then down to 500 feet, where he’ll also use a telephoto lens to capture the details: lifts, buildings and junctures of trails. This level of detail is crucial to mapping. “If I didn’t have aerial photography, and had to rely on Google Earth, it probably wouldn’t be what it is,” says Niehues. “It wouldn’t have any detail or the understanding of the slopes.”

Niehues doesn’t choose photos to trace them. They’re there to help him “manipulate perspectives,” which he has to do with any mountain that has more than one “facing slope” — which is most mountains. The more facets, the more manipulation. When sketching, Niehues focuses on getting the elevations correct (at least their relationship to each other) and makes sure everything lines up. There aren’t any secrets, says Niehues; it’s just taking what you have in front of you and stretching it here or changing the angle there. And it has to be done in a way that the skier absolutely believes it as truth.

Once the client approves the sketch, it’s then projected onto an illustration board (30 x 40 inches) and Niehues traces it. Then comes paint. Through the years, the painting process — from Shelton to Brown to Niehues — hasn’t changed much, says Niehues. He uses a Winsor & Newton designer gouache and standard brushes, nothing special. A layer of gesso goes on the illustration board. The gesso does three things: it prevents the paint from sinking into the board; it makes it easier for the painter to lift off the old color and repaint it, if that’s necessary down the road; and it gives the colors more intensity. The sky and snow are airbrushed before any paint touches the board. Then Niehues takes out his brushes. “I start painting in all the tree shadows. Once that’s done I’ll start at the top of the slopes and then work my way down with all the detail. So, all the cliffs and trees, right on way to the bottom.”

When finished, the illustration is taken to a photo lab, where they pull a very detailed, 100-megapixel scan. When Niehues first started, he’d get an 8 x 10-inch transparency of the illustration, which he describes as just a four-color slide, and the resort would use this to get printed. The finished print wasn’t nearly as detailed, and transparencies aren’t used anymore. The only other difference today is that Niehues gets a final scan back. He he can enhance the illustration’s colors and add additional contrast (mostly with Photoshop). The final product goes to the client, who will then have a graphic artist add trail names and other symbols to the trail map.

December 10, 2018 / Comments Off

366

Pirelli Calendar 2019 – The Story of the World’s Most Famous Calendar

[unable to retrieve full-text content]

December 5, 2018 / Comments Off

432

8 Bourbon Cocktails You Need to Try

Bourbon. One of those exquisite, tantalizing liquids we can drink any time, in any weather, in any place on Earth. Sometimes we like it neat, sometimes we like it on rocks, and hell, sometimes we…

The Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong Review

My ears pop as the elevator shoots up from the 9th floor entrance to the 103rd floor lobby 425 meters above sea-level. I’m at the highest hotel in the world – the Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong. The hotel occupies the top 17 floors of the 484 tall ICC tower in the Kowloon area of this intriguing city.

The hotel is easily reached from the airport with the clean and efficient MTR express train to Kowloon station. Club guests enjoy a complimentary limousine service around Kowloon. Hotspots on Hong Kong Island can be reached with a taxi, ferry or underground.

The Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong

The 302 rooms and suites are spread are located on floors 104 through to 117 with the incredible 2,800 m2 presidential suite taking up a large part of the 117th floor. All rooms offer spectacular views of Hong Kong and the South China Sea with the view of Hong Kong Island being the most desirable one.

I have booked a club room giving access to the Ritz-Carlton Club Lounge on the 116th floor. Here it is also possible to check-in, so on the 103rd floor lobby I head straight to the guest elevators taking me up to the 116th floor. The Club Lounge is the perfect all-day hang-out and meeting place. Even though the hotel has 302 rooms and runs close to full occupancy the club lounge is fairly quiet most of the day.

The Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong

My deluxe queen room 115-20 is on the 115th floor with perfect views of Hong Kong Island and parts of Kowloon. A little bench below the window allows guests to sit and just take in the world down below. The hotel is so high up that helicopters and small airplanes pass by below. The street more than 450 meters is so far away that you feel disconnected from it all.

The room itself is well equipped with a desk, large double bed and large bathroom with double sinks, a large marble rain shower, separate toilet and bathtub. I could spend all day relaxing in the room and taking in the jaw-dropping views but there is so much more to explore in the hotel and Hong Kong that I end up spending hardly any time in the room.

The Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong – Club Lounge

Opposite the Club Lounge you can find the Spa with several treatment rooms and men and women dressing rooms with a sauna. From the spa take the elevator up to the 118th floor for a swim in the highest pool in the world with floor to ceiling windows overlooking the South China Sea and parts of Hong Kong Island. There is also a jacuzzi and terrace where guests can do yoga or other sports. On the same level is also a well equipped gym.

Also on the 118th floor, but well separated from the guest-only spa and pool area, is the Ozone bar serving cocktails and tapas. More restaurants can be accessed from the 103rd floor lobby with Italian restaurant Tosca and Chinese restaurant Tin Lung Heen both awarded by Michelin. The Almas Caviar Bar, Cafe 103 and The Lounge & Bar wrap up the wide range of dining options. Club guests can also enjoy breakfast, lunch, high-tea and dinner in the club lounge.

The Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong – Fitness

The facilities and dining options are top notch with the occasional compromise due to the limited floor plan size of the tower. The dressing rooms on the pool level are a bit small per example. But one aspect really stands out during my stay at the Ritz-Carlton and that is the effortless and professional service. No request is too much and there are many little gestures (like bringing a dry towel and hot water with lemon without asking when I started coughing after swimming) which made my stay even more memorable and comfortable. Add the incredible views and unique experience to stay in the world’s highest hotels and this is one of the most desirable hotels to visit around the globe.

November 29, 2018 / Comments Off

548

Meet the Visionary Behind Japan’s Most Important Outdoor Brand

From Issue Seven of Gear Patrol Magazine.

Lisa Yamai was blushing. Earlier in the night, the heiress to Snow Peak, the largest camping brand in Japan and started by Lisa’s grandfather, swept in and manhandled our campsite. First, she finagled a finicky camp stove into working shape and then went around lighting fires with a jet-engine-like blazing torch. After dinner, we settled around a stainless steel fireplace under a sky full of stars in Niigata prefecture in Japan, a region anchored by 8,000-foot mountains, rice paddy-filled valleys and, well, Snow Peak’s headquarters.

I wanted to travel to Japan to find out more about the brand — whose footprint in the U.S. is small, but highly regarded for its impeccable aesthetic and smart, functional design — as it celebrates its 60th anniversary. Snow Peak’s success is predicated on products like beautiful and modern camp-kitchen cookware, stainless steel camp stoves, minimalist dining setups, tarps and tents. While the U.S. only makes up around 20 percent of the brand’s total sales, you’ll find that at Japan’s campgrounds, Snow Peak is one of the major players, with Coleman and Montbell thrown into the mix. The brand, however, is not lost on America’s camping-obsessed, even with all of the lower-priced competition; over the years, I’ve seen many a diehard camper unveil their few bamboo-and-steel Snow Peak products with special care and presentation, like artifacts to be revered. Suffice it to say they have a following.

Snow Peak was originally founded under the name Yamai Shoten in 1958 by 26-year-old Yukio Yamai, an avid rock climber. It’s no coincidence that this was only a year after a young Yvon Chouinard started forging his own pitons in Southern California and founded Chouinard Equipment, Ltd., the predecessor to Patagonia. At the time, the world had a heightening obsession with rock climbing. There was a growing fever over who could tackle the faces of Half Dome and El Capitan in Yosemite Valley first, while, back home in Japan, outdoor enthusiasts were celebrating the first ascent of the Himalayas’ Mt. Manaslu, the world’s eighth tallest peak, by a Japanese team.

Yukio’s location in Niigata’s Tsubame-Sanjo, an area rife with factories focused on metalwork, placed him in a prime location for professional success. He began by designing and selling his own pitons and crampons made from titanium, stainless steel and aluminum. He also designed climbing apparel that he had custom made by a tailor in town, and which he later sold to his friends separately from the Yamako brand. Much of Snow Peak’s success, though, can be attributed to Yukio’s son, Tohru Yamai, who came into the business in the mid-’80s, just as SUVs were on the rise. Tohru could sense that his community in Tokyo was craving nature, so he envisioned a camping experience that capitalized on the growing market of outdoor-oriented SUVs — one that required less labor than the school-camping trips of his youth, which involved digging a crude trench for water flow around two-piece tent setups. It was only a few years later, in the early ’90s, that Yukio and Tohru became almost single-handedly responsible for inventing Japanese outdoor camping culture as a whole.

Today, Snow Peak’s main headquarters, which is only five years old, is home to 100 public campsites and its very own gear-testing field on 41 acres of rolling grassland spliced from a neighboring golf course. Two concrete-and-glass buildings crown the property. The larger one holds offices and conference rooms, while the smaller one houses a store and a camping hub with gear rentals and vending machines filled with green tea and canned coffee. An outbuilding houses clean bathrooms — complete with Japan’s famously high-tech heated toilets — and large stainless steel sink basins for washing camp dishes. The site’s facilities are right in line with the brand’s ethos — set by Tohru thirty years ago — that camping doesn’t have to mean roughing it.

The campfire’s light bounced off Lisa Yamai’s forearms, which are covered in tattoos (a Japanese beetle and illustrations by famous Japanese artist Kiyoshi Awazu, among others) and her smile was wide as she told me about the rebellious idea she had of going to the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) in New York for college. “My father said no,” Lisa said. “I was not a good girl in high school. My dad worried; I wanted to go a different direction from society.”

This should’ve been no surprise to Tohru, given Lisa’s headstrong lineage. But, either way, her penchant for marching to her own drum has served her well. Lisa, now in her late thirties, is Snow Peak’s creative director. In parallel to what her father did 30 years ago, Lisa is moving Snow Peak forward with a line of apparel, which she launched in 2014. She also oversees the design of all hardgoods.

Her unisex designs include space-age hoodies that look like they’ve been knit with one long piece of thick cord; camouflage, insect-shielding mesh tracksuits; insulated midlayer shackets with as much stretch as yoga pants, sailcloth overalls and more. And, according to Kei Hirosawa, one of the main buyers at Tokyo’s Beams stores (which have been majorly influential in Japan’s streetwear scene), her direction is right on point. “The outdoor fashion crossover trend is growing in Japan right now,” he says, pointing me to the magazines Go Out and Outstanding, which often weave Yeti, Patagonia, The North Face and other outdoor brands into urban lifestyle.

Lisa may or may not be next in line to take over the business — it’s undecided, she says — but what is clear is that she has a lifetime of product development experience. Her field-testing days started as a three-year-old, when her dad asked her to gear-test a kid-size version of an adult camp chair. Lisa quickly discovered, through banging and shaking it, that it was far too wobbly. Since then, Snow Peak’s kids’ chairs have adopted a wider base than those designed for adults.

These days, Lisa is working hard to preserve made-in-Japan manufacturing practices across fashion via two new Snow Peak collections: Outdoor Kimono, which is exactly as it sounds (the traditional Japanese garment, built out of technical fabric), and Local Wear — indigo-dyed, patchwork and embroidered styles, inspired by the clothing of Japanese field workers in the 1950s and ’60s, strictly produced in Japan. These two lines can be found online and in the two brick-and-mortar stores Lisa opened in Tokyo and New York’s SoHo neighborhood.

The day after we camped, Lisa and I sat under a tarp display in an airy, two-story design area, where she spoke about Snow Peak’s history, how she balances her design approach with changing trends, and where she sees the brand heading in the future.

Q: When did you join Snow Peak and why?
A: I used to work at a women’s fashion brand, the kind that would put on runway shows. I felt a sense of discomfort with fashion design for self-expression, and it made me realize I was more interested in the cultures that were the source of inspiration for fashion — music, art. I wanted to create a new fashion culture within the culture closest to me, the outdoor lifestyle, so I joined Snow Peak in 2012.

Q: What has it been like to work with your dad, Snow Peak’s CEO?
A: My father has never given me directions about the apparel line. I started the apparel business in 2014, and it was a very big challenge creating a new business for Snow Peak. I’ve never tried creating a business before. I did everything, from making clothes to sales to production, and it’s run one hundred percent through my decisions. It’s really tough work, but it’s the best thing. It’s satisfying, and I am truly grateful to my father for allowing me the room to do as I please. We are also different in management style: My father adopts a totally charisma-driven “top-down” style. I believe a style of management where I rely on others around me and involve them will lead to growth of both the company and the staff.

Q: How has Snow Peak’s equipment changed over time? How important has family been to the product design?
A: I grew up camping in the ’90s. The first time my father started a camping business, we had three in the family: my parents and myself. At the time, we had simple gear that would be enough for three people. Afterward, our family grew to five, then six. As we grew in number and age, Snow Peak’s camping offerings grew in size and scope as well.

Q: What is your design philosophy when it comes to the apparel?
A: The inspiration for everything comes from my own life — five days a week in the city, and the weekends in nature. I think about the texture of fabrics, materials for outdoor wear that could blend in with urban living, simple designs, colors reminiscent of nature, and so on. When I started the apparel business at Snow Peak, there were few other brands making urban-outdoor-style clothing, only Nau and Aether. My goal is to make stylish, urban apparel that is also very comfortable. Snow Peak apparel should be seven-days-a-week, daytime-and-weekend apparel — whole-life apparel.

Q: What was the first piece you designed?
A: The first piece I designed was a flexible insulated mid-layer. It’s water-resistant and has windstop and stretchy synthetic fill. There were no comfortable middle insulated layers with flexibility [on the market]. It’s very comfortable and functional.

Q: What can we look forward to from Snow Peak?
A: Snow Peak consumers and employees who camp a lot always want a fire-resistant garment. Embers spark off the fire and make a hole in nylon or polyester, so we are working with Teijin, a big fabric-maker in Japan, to create one hundred percent Aramid fire-shielding fabric. We’ll make a jacket and a vest. Vests are very popular from Snow Peak in Japan.

Q: Which brands inspire you?
A: Filson. It’s basic, classic and original and will still be all of those things in twenty to thirty years. In fashion, I like Dries Van Noten. I like its botanical prints.

Q: And you travel a lot. Are you inspired by that?
A: Yes. I went to Mongolia to get to the source of camping. I stayed with nomadic Mongolians because I wanted to see their life, their camping style, their systems and process. They have no electronics. No running water and no wi-fi. Eating goat, their main livestock, three meals a day left a big impression on me. I didn’t learn anything for designing garments, but seeing how they paired their Tibetan Buddhist religion with the outdoors gave me perspective and balance in my philosophy for my life.

Q: Not many women-run businesses in Japan. What’s it like to know you might run Snow Peak one day?
A: My father is still the head of the company, so I haven’t yet decided to be next in line. In running a business as a woman, it is important to stand strong to our convictions and our sense of responsibility. I believe the world will continue to evolve thanks to the sensibility of women in business. I’d like there to be more women who can seriously pursue the jobs they want to do with more freedom. It’s also important to have a strong feeling of duty towards society.

Q: Is that why you’re launching Local Wear?
A: Yes. I felt a sense of crisis. Maybe fifty to one hundred years ago, all over Japan, workers were making clothes by themselves with the local materials. But, the local craftsmen are getting old — fifty, or sixty, or seventy. They don’t have a next generation in manufacturing. The local young people in the country are moving to big cities like Tokyo or Osaka, or overseas. The factories are dying, and I am worried the next generation of designers will no longer be able to produce in Japan. Every season, with each new collection being produced, a few factories are going out of business. So, Snow Peak is working to teach younger generations how to make garments. Local Wear is bringing awareness by letting people experience production firsthand.

Q: You are also working tradition into your line with the Outdoor Kimono.
A: It’s a similar philosophy. It’s a collab with a Japanese kimono company, Kimono Yamato. They have been sewing kimonos for one hundred years. They’re feeling the same things: kimono factories and kimono craftsman don’t have a next generation and will be gone. Younger people aren’t interested in wearing kimonos because it doesn’t fit the current times, influenced by Western-style clothing. So, we modernized the kimono styles with functional outdoor fabrics. The kimono is a Japanese garment and Snow Peak is Japanese outdoor camping. Both have heritage and tradition — one older, one newer — but they are linked.

November 28, 2018 / Comments Off

470

The 10 Best Shows of 2018 You Didn’t Watch

Once again, it was a great year for television. Excellent shows dropped left, right, and center all year, giving us plenty of entertainment. Too much even. As the year winds down, take advantage of your…

November 20, 2018 / Comments Off

491

The Real Toll of the West’s Battle with Fire

Photos by Stuart Palley.

Depending on conditions and their orders, firefighters build their line anywhere between miles and a stone’s throw away from the flames. Out front are the sawyers, who use chainsaws to cut trees and heavy brush, and swampers, who assist them and haul away the firewood. Behind them, the rest of the crew use hoe-like tools called pulaskis and shovels to cut into the earth, robbing the fire of its fuels and feeding it only dirt. When burning embers jump the line, starting spot fires on the line’s far side, crews sprint to its nascency and beat it out with their tools and their piss pumps. Occasionally, they light their own fires to clear out areas in front of a fire, robbing it of its fuel proactively.

Heat can be unbearable when the fire-line digging runs up against the flames. Boot soles delaminate and disintegrate if firefighters have the misfortune to linger on a ground hotspot. Flaming trees pop and explode. Shifting winds rain embers and ash on the men. Strict rules keep them from removing their heavy packs from their backs as they work.

Little has changed about this fire-line process in over 100 years. The pulaski hand tool, on one side an ax and the other an adze, has borne a “Super P,” an enlarged version of the former. Crews have also innovated “combi,” or combination, tools. Chainsaws have increased in power and decreased in size. “But other than that, digging line, clearing brush and digging, it is just the same hard, physical labor,” said Steve Gage, an assistant director of Fire & Aviation Management for the US Forest Service who’s been fighting fires since the 1970s.

There are approximately 14,500 federal wildland firefighters in the US today, down from approximately 16,000 four years ago, according to testimony by USFS Chief Thomas Tidwell before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. This summer’s intense season has revealed that this is too few, even with state and local firefighters, volunteers, international fire crews and even the military pitching in. “We are basically stretched really thin,” said Gage. “In years past, we used to stand up 600 to 800 hand crews to commit to fires.” But because of changes in demographics and economics, Gage said those numbers are down. And they can’t be spun back up in time to respond to a particularly bad fire season. “Folks need to understand,” he said, “when we get into a fire situation, we can’t just go down to the temp service. It takes training and physical ability for people to go out and fight fire.”

For the firefighters on the ground, this shortage of manpower means shifts that are supposed to last 12 hours are stretching to 14, 16, 24 or even 36 hours. They work a two-one shift — one hour of rest for every two hours worked. After their hours on the fire line, they sleep at a fire camp, usually made up of personal tents or, sometimes, a school gymnasium. Hot food is prepared to keep them fed. Every few days they get a shower. Weaver said many teams are getting only two days off between two-week assignments, sometimes less.

Photo by Stuart Palley.

Firefighters have a safety saying: “Keep one foot in the black.” They’re referring to staying on the edge of an area that’s already been burned over and is a safe refuge from flames. But there’s also the unspoken half of the saying: they always have one foot in the fire, too.

“Anybody that does the job enough will have close calls,” said David Zortman, a crew chief for the Tatanka Hotshots, an elite wildland firefighting crew based out of Custer, South Dakota. Zortman’s came while fighting a fire outside of Los Angeles, when a huge boulder, loosened by fire, pinballed down a draw straight toward him. He crawled just out of its way. Steve Gage said he once had to hunker down among rocks while a fire burned directly over him. Weaver was fighting a fire on military property when her commander picked up a piece of unexploded ordinance and said, “Whoa, look at this!” Tripp of the Yellowstone fuels crew was “smoked out” and forced to retreat through a boulder field when the wind on a fire he was scouting alone shifted 180 degrees. Another Yellowstone fuels crew member suffered heat exhaustion after a miscommunication left him on a Nevada fire line without water or food.

The litany of the firefighter is that the fire itself is not the danger. This is not true, but a look at the causes of fatalities over the years does prove a point. In 2014, not a single one of the 10 wildland firefighter deaths was the result of “burnover” or “entrapment,” deaths by fire. Seven are listed as “medical” causes, two by aviation/aircraft accidents, and one by vehicle accident. Heat exhaustion and dehydration are constant scourges. Snags, dead trees burned and made unstable by the fire, fall on firefighters and hikers every year.

And, said Tripp, “Driving kills more people every year than anything else we do.”

But fire remains deadly for crews on the ground. In 2013, 19 hotshots from the Granite Mountain team were killed after missteps led to their entrapment within the Yarnell Hill Fire in Arizona; their bodies were found burned inside the fire shelters they’d deployed as a last-ditch effort. It wasn’t the first time an entire crew has been wiped out: 14 died on Storm King Mountain, Colorado in 1994; 13 firefighters burned to death, 12 of them smoke jumpers, in 1949 at Mann Gulch, Montana; in the Big Blowup of 1910, some of the worst fires ever recorded, 78 firefighters died, including 28 from one crew alone.

“Anybody that does the job enough will have close calls.” – David Zortman, Crew Chief, Tatanka Hotshots

Changing conditions like dropping humidity, shifting winds and downbursts from a thunder cell can turn a stalled smolder into a blowup or fire whirl, which sound like a freight train and can move in the worst conditions at up to 15 mph through grass, 10 mph through shrubland and 5 mph through forest — faster than any firefighter can escape through rough terrain. Often, deadly situations involve fires below firefighters on a steep slope, where flames can accelerate 16 times faster than normal and the men must fight their way up a mountainside to escape. It’s not just howling blowups that are dangerous. As lifelong outdoorsman and US Forest Service employee Norman Maclean wrote in his book Young Men and Fire, about the 13 men who died in Mann Gulch, “It is hard to adjust yourself to the fact that a forest fire is not all a big roar behind you getting closer — a dangerous part of it is very sneaky and may actually have sneaked ahead of you or is trying to.”

In unfavorable conditions, firefighters have close to zero control over the forces they’re battling. “On any given day on any part of a fire, there’s probably close to a hundred micro-factors that influence fire behavior on that certain piece of ground,” said Gage. “All you can do is get up and get out of the way.”

Against all the dangers a fire presents, the firefighters have only their wits, their training, and small fire shelters that are little more than fiberglass-reinforced tinfoil. “It’s a big potato sack, basically,” said Tripp. “You can be inside and it’s 140 degrees, but it’s 275 degrees outside. So it gives you a chance.” But the shelters have to be deployed in the right place. “You can’t just be in the middle of a 300-foot firewall… when flames are hitting these things, they are pretty much done,” said Tripp.

Capturing Wildfire on Camera

FIrefighting-Gear-Patrol-Lead-Sidebar
“Photographing wildfire requires a combination of gear that melds together firefighting safety gear, cameras, and camping/survival items. I carry my full kit of cameras on the road with me, but usually carry two bodies and two to three lenses plus a tripod when I’m hiking around at fires. The fire pack with water, fire shelter, survival kit and lenses easily tops 35 to 40 pounds. Even that’s nothing compared to the loads firefighters carry when working a wildland fire, but I try to move as light as possible while staying safe.

“In the car I’ve got multiple radios for listening to fire channels, and heavy-duty, multi-ply off-road tires and wheels for my Subaru Outback, as well as full underbody skid plates and a full-size spare in addition to the donut. There’s also a Baja Designs off-road lightbar for driving on pitch-black forest roads in the wee hours of the morning. I carry a minimum of three days’ food and water, spare batteries, flares, extra lights, MREs and typical camping gear like a sleeping bag and cot. The car is really important because if it goes down, I’m stuck — and it’s my base for days on end.

“The best item I added this summer is a YETI cooler, which is basically a refrigerator in my car for up to three days of cool food and drinks at a time. It has enough capacity that I can offer Gatorades to anyone running low on hydration in the field.”

– Stuart Palley

Gear Pictured:

– Mystery Ranch Firelight IA fire pack + modifications to carry additional lenses
– White’s Smokejumper Boots, 10 inch
– NPPA-approved helmet, goggles, gloves, Nomex shirt and pants
– Nikon D4, D810 and various Nikkor lenses
– Wool socks and liners (x3)
– Bendix King radio, Uniden digital scanner, Kenwood UHF two-way radio
– GoPro 4 + 3-axis gimbal gyro stabilizer

Firefighters question their carrying of shelters, which add eight pounds of weight to their packs; they don’t question their training. That boils down to “LCES” — lookouts, communications, escape routes and safety zones — and what firefighters call “The 10 and the 18,” or 10 Standard Firefighting Orders and 18 Watchout Situations, including knowing what the fire is doing at all times, posting lookouts, fighting fire aggressively having provided for safety first, and not napping on the fire line. From the lowest line digger to the highest chief, firefighters believe that if they use LCES and the 10 and the 18 vigilantly, they should escape even the worst of a fire’s erratic changes. The real challenge, according to nearly every firefighter, is avoiding complacency on the fire line during long shifts. “I just recognize that, as far as staying physically sharp, I need to be mentally prepared for [being on the fire line],” said Zortman.

Increasingly, firefighters are working to protect areas in the Wildland-Urban Interface, or WUI, where fire-prone wilderness is encroached by communities and towns. Since 1990, land constituting WUI has increased at nearly 2 million acres a year, according to a report from the International Association of Wildland Fire. In 2013, the report indicated that 220 million acres of western land, and 70,000 communities, were within the WUI; in September, over 1,700 homes were destroyed from two fires alone.

Protecting homes and lives adds a new layer of complexity to firefighters’ duties. In early September, The New York Times reported that while the Valley Fire north of San Francisco burned the entire town of Middletown to the ground, “many… had ignored evacuation orders, endangering themselves, and forcing some firefighters to perform rescues rather than focus on stopping the blazes.”

Weaver believes the possibility of defending homes and homeowners who’ve stayed behind amps up the firefighters’ sense of duty and can lead to disastrous mistakes. “It makes them make decisions that they wouldn’t otherwise make. They put themselves at risk when they shouldn’t. And no one’s home is worth somebody’s life,” she said. Gage said that increasingly, leaders on the fire line are being asked to consider what might happen if they didn’t act to save structures and communities, especially in risky situations.

Some in the community believe WUI played a part in the death of the 19 Granite Mountain Hotshots on the Yarnell Hill Fire, who were killed as they made their way to defend a home. “They were basically in their home unit,” Weaver said. “They had that added level of, ‘If I let [my neighbor’s] home burn, am I going to see those people at the grocery store — at my kids’ school?’”

Photo by Stuart Palley.

“When I started in 1990, there really was a whole different way of thinking,” said Kristel Johnson. “It was, ‘If you can’t handle the stress, you shouldn’t be here.’” Johnson, a wildfire veteran (and a woman in firefighting when that was very uncommon), is the founder of two new programs designed to help firefighters deal with trauma and stress: You Will Not Stand Alone, a pre-trauma class that ensures novices know the danger they are getting into and that all firefighters have plans in place for serious injury and death; and Critical Incident Stress Management, which addresses the possible effects of trauma after the fact, using both peer support and time with a specialized clinician in a template designed for first responders, law enforcement, doctors and others worldwide. These programs, which began in California two years ago, are the first aimed solely at trauma- and stress-related issues to be instituted within federal fire services that have existed over 100 years.

Johnson started both programs after serving as a liaison to family members of a captain and crew who died on the fire line and suffering trauma herself. She believes increased fire activity in recent years has played a part in an increase in employee deaths, suicides (which some have placed at rates just as high as among military members), post-traumatic stress disorder, cumulative stress and burnout. The traumas she describes are more often associated with soldiers than with wildfire fighters: coworker deaths and suicides, aviation accidents, near-death experiences like the deployment of a fire shelter, being the first to respond to a child’s death by burning.

“When I started in 1990, there really was a whole different way of thinking. It was, ‘If you can’t handle the stress, you shouldn’t be here.’” – Kristel Johnson, National Critical Incident Stress Management Coordinator, USFS

“We’re recognizing that our firefighters are falling victim to post-traumatic stress because many of them weren’t trained to handle being the first on a scene to a helicopter crash, or the first ones to a burnover situation with fatalities,” said Gage. “We’ve not trained their minds to handle that.”

Johnson’s programs tackle the basics of stress related to trauma, beginning with the simple assertion that incoming firefighters need to know how dangerous the job can be — more common than you might imagine, considering many incoming trainees are younger than 20. Firefighters are taught about the different types of stress responses, the importance of validating that the effects of trauma are real, and coping mechanisms. After a critical incident, firefighters can call in help from peers and clinicians, something Johnson said has happened 25 times this year.

But the toughness mentality, so strongly valued elsewhere in the firefighting profession, is hard to shake. One of the men who died this year had worked under Zortman for six seasons. “As a supervisor my job was to keep him safe,” he said. “That just doesn’t go away when he leaves and goes to another crew.” Yet Zortman said he hasn’t used the Critical Incident Stress Management program since his colleague’s death.

“The personality types that work on a hotshot crew, we’re not gonna go ask for a counselor to talk about our feelings to. That’s not us. We deal with it ourselves, we talk it out,” he said.

Weaver and others who help colleagues and family members deal with death and loss love their jobs, in spite of the risks to their own health — it’s part of the burden they agree to take on. Johnson cites compassion fatigue, also known as secondary traumatic stress, as a major problem her groups hope to address among these personnel.

Gage agreed that they were a group at risk. “I admire what they do and how they do it, but I’m also concerned about the toll it takes on them,” he said.

For Weaver, being there for grieving families is just another way to deal with the risk she knows her job entails. It’s a burden she sees shared among the community. “If something were to ever happen to me on a fire,” she said, “I would hope somebody would take my daughter’s hand and be there for her.”

The El Portal Fire burns on a hillside in the Stanislaus National Forest and Yosemite National Park on Sunday evening July 27, 2014. The community of El Portal was under a mandatory evacuation. By Tuesday the blaze had burned nearly 3,000 acres. The El Portal Fire was the third significant blaze to occur in the park within the past few months. Photo by Stuart Palley.

November 20, 2018 / Comments Off

638

This Retired Roboticist Used to Design Lunar Rovers. Now He Makes Beautiful Handmade Skis

In the shadow of the Tetons, down a nondescript lane in Jackson, Wyoming, lies nondescript building. Its windowless face is sided with plain boards painted tan, its roof clad with corrugated metal. There’s an auto repair shop next door, but there are machines inside this building too. Inside, there’s a genius at work. Well, unless he’s out skiing. This is the Igneous Skis workshop.

Michael Parris, the mastermind behind Igneous, has been building custom skis by hand for almost 20 years. Watching him work is akin to witnessing a master chef navigate the fire and frenzy of a working kitchen to produce a perfectly plated paella. His movements through the shop are deliberate, and the way in which he plies the metal, wood and glue that are pervasive throughout the space is almost subconscious. Despite what might otherwise be an obvious conviction, Parris hasn’t been doing this for his entire life. In fact, he didn’t even found Igneous.

It was Adam Sherman, a longtime friend of Parris, who did that. The two met at a small ski hill in Pennsylvania called Blue Knob. Years later, Parris, who had briefly dropped out of school, joined Sherman, who had relocated to Jackson, Wyoming. It was the early 90s — skis were still very straight, and commonly came in lengths exceeding 210 centimeters. Sherman became drawn to snowboard shapes and the unique lines they allowed for on the mountain. In 1993, the pair attended the Snowsports Industries America trade show in Las Vegas and Sherman was further impressed by the quantity of startup snowboard companies exhibiting. “He was like, ‘Well if these guys can make snowboards in their garages, maybe I can make some skis’,” says Parris, describing Sherman’s assessment of the show.

Sherman began peeling apart old skis to examine their inner organs, and used that as a study for his first ski prototypes. Parris was back to his studies at Carnegie Mellon but made a point to visit Jackson and help out in the shop during school breaks. A degree in engineering earned him a job at the university building not skis, but robots.

Despite what might otherwise be an obvious conviction, Parris hasn’t been doing this for his entire life.

For Parris, robotics projects were leisure-time undertakings — he describes an exoskeleton for a human arm that can be controlled from a remote as “an art project” — but work wasn’t all tinkering. Parris became a member of a team developing robots for NASA’s lunar and Mars rover programs. Parris and a team of roughly six engineers were tasked with perfecting four-wheeled vehicles with articulating chassis capable of climbing over obstacles the size of their own wheels. Trips to Wyoming were traded in for month-long prototype testing stints in Chile’s Atacama Desert and later, Antarctica.

“That project was a meteorite search project,” says Parris. As it turns out, the ice-covered landscape of the world’s southernmost continent is fertile with meteorites, where the constant flow of ice decreases the distribution of rocks on the surface. “You can imagine a meteor that’s fallen, it’s an even distribution but the way the ice flows they might be more concentrated in certain areas. If you comb the entire ice sheet, you might go to where there are sub-surface mountain ranges and things that interrupt the flow of the ice and cause it to flow upward and spit the rocks to the surface.”

Researchers working for the National Science Foundation can comb the ice manually, or they can have a robot do it, which is where Parris and his team came into play. The meteorite-finding robot was a success, but when Parris and his team requested further funding, they were declined. It was a fortuitous downturn. “I was kind of missing skiing being down there in snow and mountains,” says Parris. So he decided to take some time off and moved to Jackson, Wyoming full-time, where he joined Sherman at the Igneous workshop.

Parris immediately set out to make good on the then-revolutionary notion that skis don’t have to be long and straight. “The plan was to make some skis that you could ride like a snowboard,” he says. “The other plan was making skis that lasted for a full season at Jackson, riding 100 days, making something that held up to the terrain here, because everybody was breaking stuff.”

“You see somebody with these skis and ask them, ‘Hey what are those skis?,’ and the next question is going to be, ‘how do you like them?’ And so you have the conversation about it and the last guy who bought your skis is now your salesman.”

Sherman and Parris weren’t dreaming small either. The pair wanted to be a presence within the ski industry, so they ramped up production from about to 300 or 400 pairs of skis per year. Igneous did garner some well-earned acclaim, but neither Sherman nor Parris were satisfied. “We were working long hours and not skiing as much as we wanted to and not paying ourselves — so we were just getting old,” says Parris.

So the pair scaled back. They made skis for themselves and their friends. They stopped marketing the company, too. Igneous skis are plain to those in the know thanks to their all-wood veneer top sheets, but they are also deridingly lacking in logos and branding. “It was just word of mouth; seeing who showed up and what they wanted,” explains Parris. “It’s still just word of mouth. You see somebody with these skis and ask them, ‘Hey what are those skis?,’ and the next question is going to be, ‘how do you like them?’ And so you have the conversation about it and the last guy who bought your skis is now your salesman.” It worked; slowly, Igneous began to find its place.

In 2007, Sherman moved back to Maryland to become a firefighter, paramedic and physician’s assistant; Parris stayed in the Tetons, building skis. At the heart of Parris’s process is a high level of individualized customization. Providing that not only requires a microscopic understanding of how skis are built, but also a closer relationship with the customer than a factory worker building skis in Austria will ever get. For that, Parris and Sherman devised an interview process in order to figure out where, how and why a customer skis. It’s a line of questioning that’s straightforward, but borders on existential: “How and where you can come up with,” says Parris, “but why you ski? People were like, “huh?”

Nevertheless, Parris can gain a remarkable amount of information through a simple conversation. “Our clients don’t necessarily have the vocabulary to talk about their skiing in terms of what they want, but I can ask them a series of questions, and pick their brain a little bit, and figure out something that’ll suit them,” says Parris. He also seeks out information from a client’s friends, instructors and guides who might have more insight. And then, Parris is happy to make a couple turns with a client up on Teton Pass and make observations first hand.

From there, what’s left is to build the actual ski. The way Parris describes it, the process is straightforward and simple, but maybe that’s just compared to building robots. At the very least, it’s incredibly sensible. Parris starts with the ski’s core. A core can be made from many types of wood — maple, white ash, Douglas fir, poplar — and many comprise more than a single species. Parris builds the sidewalls with hard maple for added durability. Then there’s base material, graphite, fiberglass, aluminum, kevlar and triaxial glass. Saws and planers and pliers are involved. Glue, finishing, ski wax. The outcome is designed to carry a body down a mountain at amazing speed. But more than that, the result is graceful, curvy, grainy; Igneous skis are beautiful enough to hang untouched on a wall. But that would be an unfortunate waste.

When Parris first joined Sherman at Igneous, he harbored very different ideas about building skis. “I had thoughts of automating the process and basically designing a ski manufacturing robot. A machine where you’d feed raw materials into one end and it’d spit a ski out the other end,” he says. But he soon realized that, like the idea of producing 300 to 400 pairs of skis per year, that would go against exactly what makes Igneous skis so special. “I realized as I got back in touch with working with my hands, that that’s what I really like to do,” says Parris. Now, he makes roughly 100 pairs each year, which allows him to pay singular attention to each step in the process. And, it affords him more time to do what he came to Jackson to do in the first place: ski.

“I go out and ski in the mornings and think about the skis that I’m on and how I can make them better, and I come in and have somebody’s name on my production list — making skis for Bill today. I think about the last time I skied with Bill and what he’s told me about the skis I made for him last time and just get to work. Keeping it small is key.”

November 13, 2018 / Comments Off

385

This Is the California Company Making Desktop Hi-Fi Affordable

From Issue Seven of Gear Patrol Magazine.

Let’s get any confusion around its name out of the way. Schiit Audio is pronounced just like it reads — “shit.” That was intentional. “One of the reasons that we ended up with the company name was my wife,” says Jason Stoddard, cofounder of the California-based audio brand. “When I was going into the garage every night saying ‘I’ve got way too much shit to do,’ or ‘I can’t deal with this shit,’ she finally got exasperated and said, ‘Why don’t you just call the fucking company ‘shit’ because that’s all you ever do.’” He just went with it.

Stoddard started Schiit Audio with Mike Moffat in 2010. Both men came from hi-fi backgrounds. Stoddard had been a lead engineer at Sumo, a now-defunct company known for its high-end amplifiers, and Moffat helped design really expensive digital-to-analog converters for Theta Digital. The two men became friends in the early ’90s — their respective companies at the time shared a parking lot — and the idea of making high-end desktop audio components brought them back together. But they didn’t just want to make good components, they also wanted to make them cheap. Real cheap.

It was Moffat who came up with the idea to sell digital-to-analog converters (DACs) two years later for $99. Stoddard followed suit with a similarly priced headphone amp. Those two components, along with a quality pair of headphones, are really all most people need to improve the sound of their desktop setups — the problem back then was that they weren’t at all affordable. Since Schiit’s inception, the two owners have been trying to “out-cheap” each other, explained Moffat. Today, the company has a line of audio components that all start with entry-level prices, usually around $99.

Schiit Audio’s first break came in 2010 in the form of good press. The guys at Head-Fi, a well-respected desktop audio forum, reached out to Stoddard and Moffat about reviewing one of their affordable headphone amps. At the time, the pair was still working out of Stoddard’s garage. “There was nothing,” he says. “Heck, we did a million dollars in sales in the garage.”

Now nearing its eighth year as a company, Schiit Audio is doing just fine. The company has over 20 employees and, by Stoddard’s estimations, saw 30 percent growth in each of the last three years. Schitt also moved its operations into a 15,000-square-foot factory in Valencia, California.

The company’s bread and butter remains good-but-cheap hi-fi components, although Schiit Audio occasionally flexes its muscles with more sophisticated DACs and amplifiers that push the limits of the definition of “cheap” audio. And despite its burgeoning audiophile-grade reputation, Schiit Audio continues to have a playful, tongue-in-cheek attitude to pretty much everything.

Take the names of its products — Asgard, Valhalla, Bifrost, Loki, Magni and Modi — all references to Norse mythology. But neither Stoddard or Moffat has any real ties to Norway; nor do they particularly like Norse mythology. They just like that there are a lot of gods, and thus, a lot of good names. “People do make fun of us for some of our very strange names,” Stoddard says. “They always ask me, ‘How the hell do you pronounce this?’ And I’m like, ‘We don’t know, we’re dumb Americans.’”

If going after the low end of the audio market was Schiit Audio’s first “odd business decision,” as Stoddard put it, the second was to make everything in the States. Schiit Audio likes to keep manufacturing as close to home as possible. “Our board manufacturers are about twenty miles away; our metal guys — we have two of them — are seven to twenty miles away; our transformers are from up in NorCal, and our knobs are done in Detroit,” Stoddard says. “The thing is that the stuff is actually made here. We’re not trying to do a dance.”

The problem with making everything in the States, predictably, is that it’s expensive. Schiit Audio countered that issue, in part, by selling everything directly from its site, cutting costs nearly in half. Stoddard and Moffat also decided to house their audio products in aluminum sheet metal, which is cheap and practical. The aluminum chassis in all their products acts as a natural heat sink. And the simple designs allowed them to make the amps and DACs efficiently. “We use the same perf pattern and the same basic design tropes on every product,” Stoddard explains. “We try to keep it very clean, very simple and very minimal. And it’s held up. We’re eight years in and it doesn’t look particularly dated.”

Most people won’t spend a couple hundred dollars on a DAC and amp. Stoddard and Moffat know that. The $99 price point of their entry-level products is designed to break down any psychological barrier that may exist. They want people to know that there’s an easy and affordable way to upgrade their desktop audio setup. And if it looks cool, all the better.

“I was conditioned with [the belief] that it’s got to be expensive to be good,” Stoddard says about audio gear. “And I thought, ‘Could I even do a headphone amp for $99?’ Sure enough, we found out that not only can you do it, but you can do it well.”

Fulla 2 Headphone DAC/Amp

If you’re just looking to spend $99 and no more, the Fulla 2 is what you want. It’s both a headphone amp and a DAC, and it’s super easy to set up: just plug it directly into your laptop or desktop. It’s a great starting point for anybody looking to improve their desktop’s audio situation.

Magni (Headphone Amp), Modi 2 (DAC) Stack

The Magni is the headphone amp and preamp. The Modi is the DAC. And the “stack” — you’re supposed to stack the two components on top of each other — is basically the upgrade option to the Fulla 2. If you have higher-end headphones or if you just want a setup that’s a little nicer, the Magni and Modi stack is what you want. “You’re done on the desktop with [this stack],” Stoddard says, “You don’t really need anything else.” |

Schiit Loki Equalizer

The Loki is the next addition to the Magni and Modi stack. The four-band equalizer is the same size and style as the other components, so they’ll all looked nice and neat when stacked on top of each other. The Loki gives you the ability to tweak the tone of the audio. You can make it sound flatter, more equalized or boost the punch of the bass. If your headphones or desktop speakers sound too bright or too dark, this tunes out those imperfections.

November 12, 2018 / Comments Off

566

The 7 Best Productivity Notebooks to Help You Get Sh*t Done

Whether you’re carrying it in your back pocket, sticking it in your bag, or leaving it on your desk, a productivity notebook is a good thing to have. Maintaining an organized notebook can keep you…

Menswear Trends Stolen from the Military

Whether or not you’re conscious of it, your wardrobe has extremely deep military roots. People might have wanted to dress like their war heroes or soldiers brought back certain gear that adapted well to civilian…

The Turbulent History of Rye Whiskey: The Real American Spirit

For brewing and distilling, these are days of revival. Brewing was a macro-lager mess up until a few years ago, when craft brewing exploded, giving us roughly ten million choices in even the smallest liquor…

10 Things You Never Knew About IKEA

IKEA is one of the most recognizable brands in modern history. From desks to dish racks, IKEA has a little bit of everything for everyone. But you don’t get to where IKEA is in the…

A Veteran Photographer on the Intimacy of Portraiture

Born in Southern California and raised from what he calls “humble beginnings,” Tim Davis has built an enviable career as a photographer. First starting out in graphic design, an internship at Patagonia eventually led him to shift his focus behind the lens. Now, 13 years into his tenure as a staff photographer at Patagonia, Davis spends the chunk of his time in the field, shooting gear in action, with refreshing reprieves in the studio and editing deskside.

By nature, most of Davis’ work in the outdoor space has required him to be somewhat removed, an observer documenting as a photojournalist. But in his free time, Davis has been taken by the more intimate nature of portraiture. He’s studied the work of the masters of the craft, recreating classic set-ups and dialing-in studio lighting. His go-to has been the Leica M10, favoring its history, timeless craftsmanship and slender design. Davis took us along on some of his recent portrait shoots, behind the curtain at Patagonia’s creative studios and into his own home workshop to share more about this nuanced form of photography and how he approaches it. Read on for a look into his world.

On becoming a photographer:
“I’ve had an affinity for still photography since I was a kid. My uncle was a special effects photographer in the film days back in the ‘70s-’80s in New York City. I remember being 7- or 8-years-old and visiting his studio, being really impressed. My grandfather also owned a little camera store. My first camera was a little Kodak; I can’t even remember what it was called. It had discs of film and I would blast through them. By the time I was 16 or 17, my mom got me my first SLR, which was a Minolta with three lenses. It wasn’t a quality camera but I thought it was amazing.

Initially, in college, I was a fine art major. But I came from pretty humble beginnings so I had to figure out how to make a little money. I knew I wanted to do something in the arts. But I knew being a fine art major and making fine art was a really sketchy gamble. At first, getting into graphic design was amazing because you start making a little bit of money, but it was too much computer time. When I was at UCSB in the Graphic Design Department, I freelanced at Patagonia doing graphic design. While I was freelancing as a graphic designer, I switched [disciplines] and went to Brooks Institute of Photography back when it was located in Santa Barbara. Photography and filmmaking was a really neat way to see the world and be out and shooting amazing stuff. You do still get some technical stuff. You work really hard and then you get back in the office and have a more civilized environment with a cup of coffee at 8:30 in the morning and you get to process.”

On portraiture:
“The drawback to outdoor photojournalistic photography, at least for me, is that it’s a lonelier experience. You’re not involved, ideally, in the making of a photo. You’re just there to document it. That’s a neat experience, but the advantage to portraiture is that you’re involved in creating the photo. Portraiture is a lot more intimate in that sense. You get to work with the subject. If you look at the Henri Cartier-Bresson approach to it, he looked at the camera as a tool. In a way, it could encumber the process if you let it. It was about you and me and if I did my job right, I really captured the moment. It’s as simple as that.

When you’re taking someone’s portrait, it’s case by case. When working with a professional athlete or model, someone who has been photographed a lot, it’s a really easy process. They do what they do and I do what I do, and hopefully, we make something really great. If you get someone that’s nervous in front of the camera, the direction becomes more nuanced. You want to evoke the right look but you don’t want to make them feel more nervous. It’s a delicate balance. We have a finite limit to how long we can be photographed; I think a human can be photographed for maybe 8 minutes.”

On shooting with the Leica M:
“For photojournalism, it’s really nice to show up with something small and lightweight and unobtrusive. If you show up with a big SLR, and you’re trying to be stealthy, it’s just not going to happen. If you show up with the Leica M with a small 50mm on it, they might not know you’re shooting amazing photos on it. And the beauty of a manual camera like the M is that it makes a different photo.

There is something really special about a camera that’s been relatively unchanged for 100 years. These really teeny beautiful lenses are handmade and these camera bodies still look the same. There’s something tactile. They’re heavy. It’s handmade with brass and glass and someone is making each one.”

Meet the Leica M10

Leica took its expertise from more than 60 years since launching the M Series — 11 making digital M Cameras — to create the Leica M10. It is the slimmest digital M ever made with dimensions as slender as analogue M-Cameras. Combining heritage with technology, the slim and elegant camera uses a specially developed 24 MP, full-frame CMOS sensor and a Maestro II image processor, delivering extended dynamic range as well as ISO values up to 50,000. Learn More

On photographic legends:
“I have a slight obsession with black and white portrait photographers. We don’t use a ton of portraiture here [at Patagonia], even less black and white, so developing those ideas happens outside of work. Researching the old images and techniques of the legends (like Avedon, Newton, Elgort, Demarchelier, Lindberg and so on) is so rewarding: a Bob Marley portrait shot on auto with Kodak film bought at the local drug store; Avedon teasing his subjects or his 8×10 wooden camera with a white seamless taped to a barn; Bresson’s 50mm that he shot his entire career; Nachtwey’s focusing techniques and Tri-X film; Capa and Gerda Taro and love, war and death; Mark Seliger’s brick studio stairwell; Leibovitz and box studios. There is so much to learn: the techniques, the mistakes, the complexities, simple solutions, love of the medium and their subjects, the heartbreak, drugs, death, insecurities or regrets. It’s all so amazing and so human. I’m fascinated with the old legends and their lore.

Everything that’s happening in photography has been done and has maybe been done 100 years ago. It’s at least been done 50 years ago. We’re almost 70 years past when Richard Avedon was at his prime and Irving Penn was at his prime — and the fashion magazines on every shelf today are clearly influenced by these guys. I’m just trying to pay homage to the legends.” — Tim Davis, Senior Photographer, Patagonia

October 26, 2018 / Comments Off

767

All posts in “Features”

1. Koenigsegg Ragnarok

3. Mercedes-AMG ONE

6. Toyota Supra

8. Corvette C8

9. Cayman GT4

10. Ferrari 488 Successor

11. McLaren Sport Series

12. Aston Martin DBS GT Zagato

13. Porsche 992 Cabriolet

14. Bentley Flying Spur

15. BMW M8

Related Stories

Billy Reid

114 N. Court St., Florence, AL 35630 ⇱ | (877) 757-3934 | billyreid.com

American Rag Cie

150 S. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90036 ⇱ | (323) 935-3154 | americanrag.com

County Ltd.

1837 Hyperion Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90027 ⇱ | (323) 741-8337| countyltd.com

Deus Ex Machina

1001 Venice Blvd., Venice, CA 90291 ⇱ | (888) 515-3387 | deuscustoms.com

General Admission

52 Brooks Ave, Venice, CA 90291 ⇱ | (310) 399-1051 | generaladmission.us

Iron & Resin Garage

324 E. Main St., Ventura, CA 93001 ⇱ | (805) 643-0737 | ironandresin.com

Standard and Strange

5010 Telegraph Avenue, Oakland, CA 94609 ⇱ | (510) 373-9696 | standardandstrange.com

Self Edge

714 VALENCIA ST., SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94110 ⇱ | (415) 558-0658 | selfedge.com

Unionmade

493 Sanchez St., San Francisco, CA 94114 ⇱ | (415) 861-3373 | unionmadegoods.com

Wasteland

1660 Haight St., San Francisco, CA 94117 ⇱ | (415) 863-3150 | shopwasteland.com

Welcome Stranger

460 Gough St., San Francisco, CA 94102 ⇱ | (415) 864-2079 | welcomestranger.com

Canoe Club

777 Pearl Street, Boulder, CO 80302 ⇱ | (720) 282-3114 | shopcanoeclub.com

Armitage & McMillan

1550 Platte St., Suite D, Denver, CO 80202 ⇱ | (303) 284-6222 | armitageandmcmillan.com

Steadbrook

46 S. Broadway, Denver, CO 80204 ⇱ | (720) 441-1891 | steadbrook.com

Topo Designs

2500 Larimer St., Denver, CO 80205 ⇱ | (303) 954-8420 | topodesigns.com

Supply & Advise

223 SE. 1st St., Miami, FL 33131 ⇱ | (305) 960-2043 | supplyandadvise.com

Leather Soul

2233 Kalakaua Ave. #301, Honolulu, HI, 96815 ⇱ | (808) 922-0777 | leathersoul.com

Independence

47 E. Oak St., Chicago, IL 60611 ⇱ | (312) 675-2105 | independence-chicago.com

Friend

2115 Magazine St., New Orleans, LA 70130 ⇱ | (504) 218-4214 | friendneworleans.com

Bodega

6 Clearway St. Boston, MA 02115 ⇱ | shop.bdgastore.com

Portland Dry Goods Co.

237 Commercial St., Portland, ME 04101 ⇱ | (207) 699-5575 | seawallshop.com

Beaux Biens

6 Dock Square, Rockport, ME, 01966 ⇱ | (978) 309-5645 | beauxbiens.com

Askov Finlayson

204 1st St. N., Minneapolis, MN 55401 ⇱ | (612) 206-3925 | askovfinlayson.com

BlackBlue

614 Selby Ave., St. Paul, MN 55102 ⇱ | (651) 260-5340 | blkblu.com

Martin Patrick 3

212 3rd Ave. N., #106, Minneapolis, MN 55401 ⇱ | (612) 746-5329 | martinpatrick3.com

Persona

122 Main St., Nashua, NH 03062 ⇱ | (603) 886-2707 | shop-persona.com

Izzy Martin

103 Amherst Dr SE, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87106 ⇱ | (505) 235-9493 | izzymartin.com

The Armoury

168 Duane Street, New York, NY 10013 ⇱ | (646) 613-7613 | thearmoury.com

Best Made Co.

36 White St., New York, NY 10013 ⇱ | (646) 478-7092 | bestmadeco.com

Front General Store

143 Front St., Brooklyn, NY 11201 ⇱ | (347) 693-5328 | frontgeneralstore.com

J.Crew Ludlow Shop

50 Hudson St., New York, NY 10013 ⇱ | (212) 587-3139 | jcrew.com

NikeLab

21 Mercer St., New York, NY 10013 ⇱ | (212) 226-5433 | nikelab.com

Ralph Lauren Mansion

867 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10021 ⇱ | (212) 606-2100 | ralphlauren.com

Steven Alan

1837 Hyperion Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90027 ⇱ | (323) 741-8337
| countyltd.com