Work in Progress

An inside look at the materials, the process, and the travel destinations that shape and inspire our work.
Before It Knows You
Before It Knows You
Most bags make a choice between everyday carry and travel. We haven't carried one that handles both without cost. That's the problem we're designing towards. Read more...
Pantone 7457 — A Short History
Pantone 7457 — A Short History
Canard Blue is Pantone 7457. The reason that number means anything to every supplier and partner we work with goes back to a chemist from New Jersey who bought a... Read more...
Independent Objects
Independent Objects
Reading a Jasper Morrison interview last weekend, there was a line about anonymously designed objects working better than ego-driven ones. It put a name to something we've been trying to... Read more...
What the Spec Doesn't Know
What the Spec Doesn't Know
A strap passed every load test and came back wrong anyway. A founder note on the gap between what a spec sheet measures and what it actually takes to make... Read more...
Good Enough Was Never the Problem
Good Enough Was Never the Problem
We pulled the sample, ordered another, and waited eight weeks. The zipper was fine the first time. A founder reflection on the real cost of perfectionism in product development. Read more...
So You Make Bags?
So You Make Bags?
I had coffee with a potential partner last week in a shop near our London office. I spent fifteen minutes laying out the architecture of Canard. I talked about the... Read more...
Tooth and Ink
Tooth and Ink
I am staring at a fat, open-spine binding with a white cross on the cover. A gift from Pia Wallén at her gleaming, oh-so-Swedish studio in Stockholm. My wife and... Read more...
Building Without Permission
Building Without Permission
I spent twenty years pretending I knew how to build websites. I called it dabbling, but really I was just learning enough CSS to change a hex code or move... Read more...
Impossible Triangle
Impossible Triangle
I spent forty-five minutes today explaining why shipping is complicated to an app developer. On his screen, software travels at the speed of light. In my world, a twenty-foot container... Read more...
Slow Boat
Slow Boat
I'm staring at a cell in a spreadsheet labeled: Estimated Landed Cost. The number shifts every time I toggle between shipping 500 units to a warehouse in Northampton versus keeping... Read more...
The Invisible Ones
The Invisible Ones
I spent five minutes this morning staring at an Instagram ad for a brand that makes overpriced water bottles. It was a perfect, frictionless video with a pulsing lo-fi beat... Read more...