Barcelona - Plan Cerdà

Barcelona - Plan Cerdà

Barcelona's Eixample grid was drawn in 1859 as an engineering solution, not an aesthetic one. Today the same 550 blocks hold four three-Michelin-star restaurants, two bars in the world's top...
The Hand of It
The first time you close a Riri zipper, you notice before you can explain what you've noticed. A short essay on what the luxury zip decision actually means for carry... Read more...
What Breathes
Most waterproof membranes breathe best when you're working hard. Polartec NeoShell was built on a different assumption, and the case it makes for travel outerwear still stands. Read more...
Still In
In May the system shows its hand. What stays in the bag is a design decision you already made, or one you're still paying for. Read more...
What the Tape Says
Most buyers of waterproof gear read the membrane spec. But the seam is where performance actually gets tested, and its construction level tells you something honest about what the product... Read more...
June in the Bag
Summer trips are being planned and the bag is being repacked for them. The question of whether the jacket goes in is the wrong question. At the right weight, it... Read more...
The Diagonal
The crosshatch visible on an X-Pac panel is not a texture choice. It is the surface signature of a structural layer inside the laminate, and the angle of that layer... Read more...
Where the Load Is
The bar tacks on a product are a map. Where the maker places them tells you which junctions were stress-tested and which ones weren't. Read more...
The Shape It Holds
Structure in a bag isn't added; it's designed in or deliberately designed out. The question is what the object needs to do when it's empty. Read more...
What the Test Misses
There's a gap between what a product test measures and what field use reveals. Factory tests answer the right questions about the wrong conditions. Read more...
Read the Zip
There's a test you can do on any bag in about four seconds. Pull the main zip. What you find tells you more about the product than the hang tag... Read more...
The Invisible Fastener
A buckle that requires two hands, in the rain, with gloves on, is saying something about how it was made. Hardware is the interface between the object and the hand,... Read more...
What the Sample Teaches
The first product sample is never right. That's not a failure of the process, it's the reason to make it. What a prototype teaches about carry goods design cannot be... Read more...