Introduction
I’ve been searching for a solid backpack which looks good and has a bit of versatility. I came across the Tropicfeel Hive backpack (like many more do due to their insane marketing budget :p) but I thought it was relatively expensive. After doing more research and coming across brands like Tom Bihn, AER and Nomatic I figured it was in roughly the same price range. During black friday I managed to pick up the backpack for 25% discount. I bought it together with the 12L packing cube and the toiletry kit.
I wanted to share my review here since it might be a cool pack for more people and I just like to share my experience and packing list. I’ve taken the bag to a trip in Spain and Italy. The way I have it packed up now is how I usually (want to) travel. However sometimes I don’t bother taking all the camera equipment which leaves room for 2 more packing cubes or roughly a week of extra clothing.
For anyone that wants to see all the images: …
I had the pleasure to explore South Korea for a couple of weeks last October/November and finally try a proper onebag trip (having gone through some trial and error with domestic trips pre the return of international travel). I thought some people might be interested so thought I’d share my packing list given how much inspiration I’ve had from this sub over the past year.
Temperature ranged from 0-20 degrees (celcius) and activities included the usual shopping and sightseeing, but also a few days hiking and a cheeky trail run.
Overall the experience was really liberating. I didn’t feel like I missed anything and was able to focus more on the travel experience. In fact I overpacked in a couple of areas, so have been working through some more optimisation in recent months.
MVP’s
I’ve been thinking of getting a set of packing cubes but I’m curious how different they are from a canvas small bag or something similar?
This came up after u/abe1x’s [excellent] Year in Fabrics post.
Though it was somewhat polarizing, the Dreamweight Hoodie (Experiment 022) is one of my favorite pieces of all time. Some folks found the fabrics prone to snags or holes, and it seemed to shrink funny for some people as well. I didn’t have either issue, and I absolutely loved the thing.
It was a layering piece that I threw on under the Shank Jacket often (great for SF weather). It was an outer layer in summer that offered tremendous protection on my arms and neck.
I wore it on work trips all over the globe (and found it to be awesome for travel as well).
Mine is now full of holes, covered in pills, and terribly sun bleached, but since it was one of the earliest Dreamweight pieces, I thought it may be useful for folks to see how the fabric has changed since I first bought it back in summer of 2017.
Here’s Dreamweight after 4.5 years of heavy use. The interior is still as black as it was the day I …
When the topcoat was released, I rolled my eyes so hard at the price. I admit it. I wondered, “am I in a dysfunctional relationship?”
Did I want it? Hell, yes. But I’ve been down this road before. A decade ago I bought a made-in-Manhattan fleece jacket from Vaute Couture (rest in peace); it was insanely expensive and it was NOT AT ALL WARM. (To be fair, it pretty much looked brand new for 10 years, so there’s that). Oh goddess, it was ugly too because it was filthy pond gray. But I digress.
Anyway, because people have raved about this coat, and because the poncho in the same material is one of my GOAT outlier pieces, I ordered. It arrived yesterday—the fedex woman delivered it to my door during a winter storm, as luck would have it.
Me and this coat have only been in a relationship for 36 hours. But I’m here to tell you—jumping on a sofa, looking like an idiot, a la Tom Cruise—that this coat is AMAZING. I might be in love.
Right now, there are 20 mile per hour winds here, and it’s …
Long-Term Review - Ramiefall Yes Pants (Exp Version)
#Initial Ramiefall Yes Pants Review Found Here
##My goal is to write this review with the assumption that you have read my previous review, which is linked above.
#Overall Long-term Impressions - Short-hand: Insanely cozy as they are worn, but durability concerns are the main game with this fabric (Especially more-so for being pants, and serious kudos to Outlier for putting “Durability: Low” on the Ramiefall Yes Pants retail page to reflect those concerns). Get them if you’re wanting cozyness with a super casual look and don’t mind durability. Consider the F.Cloth variant if you want some level of cozyness with durability.
#Overall Long-term Impressions - Long-hand: These are still my go-to cozy, WFH pants for when I want that natural fabric, soft, loungey pants. As a testament to how much I like them, I have since purchased two new pairs. HOWEVER, my Seascape pair did fall prey to the durability concerns. Seen in the photos, …
Cottonweight feels to me like one of those core Outlier fabrics – both because they put out a lot of it and because it’s unique (as far as I know) to Outlier. It’s also one of those concepts that seems both hilariously obvious and complicated: we like feeling merino against our skin, and we like cotton’s durability and ability to take color, so let’s put merino on the inside and cotton on the outside. It’s also a hotly debated material both here and on the discord, with strong feelings both for and against due to its many quirks. Still, I didn’t think I’d be reviewing it as an eulogy until Abe strongly implied in his year in review post that cottonweight is dead. (Given that it’s still in stock at a reduced price, maybe swan song, in Abe’s phrasing, is more appropriate than eulogy.)
I don’t think you can separate materials from their form factors when considering their impact, and in this case it seems like the Outlier crew made a big shift in what they perceive cottonweight’s ideal …