Back in the good old days, before some of us were born and before any of us were designing outdoor gear, REI and EMS were limited to a few bricks-and-mortar stores, The North Face was a little company that made tents and bags and most people spent time outdoors in order to shoot things. Thirty-five years later, most people still go outdoors to hunt and fish, but gear nominally designed for backpacking has become mainstream. There are dozens of brands making thousands of products for everything from free-skiing to hanging out at bars in Williamsburg. Once upon a time, the challenge was finding lightweight camping gear. Now the challenge is deciding between dozens of products designed for the same purpose.

We Boreas folks have grown up in the outdoor industry. We’ve ridden its wave from fringe specialty market to an economic engine throwing off hundreds of billions of dollars in the US alone. While we wouldn’t trade the advances in materials and manufacturing techniques for the canvas-and-thread of the old days, we do miss the simplicity of a smaller industry dominated by passionate outdoors-people. That appreciation for clever design with existing materials rather than on slavish incorporation of the latest technology helps inform our design vision. We think smart, simple designs are generally the right choice for weight, comfort, function and value. This season’s Boreas packs were designed on those principles.

To celebrate our appreciation for simpler times, we’re launching a series of blog posts celebrating the design heroes of the good old days, the men and women who created some of the cleverest pack, bag, tent and apparel designs and whose legacy lives on in today’s gear.