There’s only one brand that has outdoor enthusiasts, graffiti writers, soldiers and TikTok fashionistas all competing to be the sole proprietor of their products, yes we’re talking about Arc’teryx.
This widespread love of the brand across vastly differing subcultures can be attributed to the quality, functionality and heritage of its products universally speaking to people from all walks of life. People are proud of their Arc’teryx product, no matter what they use it for, and it’s skeletal Archaeopteryx is forever worn as a badge of honour whether it be on the peaks, streets or field.
The immense desirability of the dead bird didn’t happen over night, although it may seem that way, but instead was built up incrementally by pushing the boundaries of technical outdoor gear for over 30 years.
From humble beginnings as ‘Rock Solid Manufacturing’, to its adoption by Pacific North-West graffiti writers and eventually to it’s explosion within fashion circles, Arc’teryx’s brand history is richer than most, and as with all the most influential brands in the world, its story can be told through it’s vast catalogue of innovative product over the years.
This catalogue started in a dusty Vancouver basement…
(c.1989) The Rock Solid Harness
Back in 1989, the brand’s founder, Dave Lane, had a difficult conundrum – one many boundary pushing climbers seem to have gone through. The gear he was using was not good enough.
Frustrated with the harnesses of the time, Dave decided that he would try his hand at forging his own, and after a long while wrestling with a sewing machine, he finally had something he was happy with. We can only imagine how scary that first use must’ve been – dangling hundreds of feet from the ground, suspended entirely by something he made in his basement – but it worked, and more importantly, it worked better than anything else available at the time.
Naturally Dave showed his creation to his wall hanging accomplices, and naturally, they all wanted one of their own. Responding to the increased demand, Dave decided that he needed to stamp his product with a name indicative of their build quality – Rock Solid.
Rock Solid Manufacturing only lasted for a single year, but it’s early termination didn’t come for the wrong reasons, but rather, because it didn’t take long for people to see the value in Dave’s work.
(c.1994) Bora Backpack
In 1990, Dave was approached by an old friend, Jeremy Guard, who had been quietly crunching numbers in the finance sector whilst Dave had been learning his trade. Guard had noticed Rock Solid’s growth and wanted a piece of the action, and after a pretty quick chat with Dave, joined as an equity partner when the company’s total sales were $30,000. The duo began tooling up to enter the American market.
There was one glaring issue though. The pair weren’t really getting on with the name. Or the aesthetics of the products. Actually, the only thing they were into was the design. So, it was settled – they made the bold move to rebrand.
Arc’teryx was the name that was settled on, deriving from Archaeopteryx Lithographica – the first bird to develop feathers to allow for flight. The name was representative of the basement passion project beginning to grow feathers of it’s own.
Obviously, we’re speaking figuratively there, the brand was actually growing backpacks, and they were even bigger a hit than the harnesses. Dave’s knowledge of hardwearing, outdoor suitable design was channelled through larger textile factories to produce the brands first cult product – The Bora Backpack.
The Bora was a highly innovative product, initially designed for alpine use, but became synonymous with all genres of outdoor pursuits, thanks to its incredibly robust build quality, number of pockets, striking colours, and of course, that new skeletal Archaeopteryx logo.
The Bora marked the brand’s first foray into packs, but it would go on to become Arc’teryx’s bread and butter of the early ’90s, with additional notable models being the Khamsin, Sebring & Miura.
(c.1998) Alpha SV
In 1998, Arc’teryx would unveil their most innovative product of all time, the Alpha SV. Unfortunately however, Dave would not be there to see it, after parting from the company in 1995 to seek pastures new in the realm of windsurfing and snowboarding.
The Alpha SV came as the by-product of Arc’teryx gaining a license to use Robert Gore’s new GORE-TEX wonder fabric. Jeremy Guard and other employees had seen the potential for GORE-TEX and knew that it was already becoming the future for outdoor garments, and they wanted to implement it in a way that would define the future of hard-shells.
No expense was spared in the creation of the Alpha SV, it was to be the El Capitan of alpine climbing jackets. The end product was a fully waterproof, seam taped, Watertight zipper equipped three layer GORE-TEX behemoth.
It reinvented what was thought possible in the hard-shell world, and it was recognised for this. Right at the top of everyone who was committing to a serious alpine expedition’s gear list was an Alpha SV. The SV stood for severe, and these were exactly the conditions it was designed for.
(c.1999 Theta AR)
Arc’teryx had struck gold with their hard-shell formula used in the creation of the Alpha SV and were keen to build on it. This saw the introduction of an entourage of other shell jackets, utilizing a naming system which would be kept in place indefinitely.
The original three categories were as follows:
SV – Severe Weather, designed to be worn for prolonged periods in the harshest weather conditions imaginable.
AR – All Round, ideal for multiple activities thanks to the range of features that each product has. AR products are designed with more of a focus on weatherproof technology rather than on shedding grams,
LT – Lightweight, designed with a streamlined set of features that make them exceptionally light and robust while still providing ample weather protection.
With their new, simple (but admittedly slightly complicated) naming system, Arc’teryx was able to categorise their fleet of hard-shells easily, and the frontrunner at the time was the Theta AR. The Theta was essentially a scaled down, slightly heavier, Alpha SV – ideal for most outdoor pursuits where saving weight wasn’t the main priority
The versatility and relative, compared to the Alpha, affordability made the Theta a hit with many different consumer groups, including one that knew more about putting jackets down their draws than quickdraws…
In the late ’90s Arc’teryx became synonymous with the graffiti and tagging scene happening in the Pacific North West, and their dead birds were not captured humanely. It became common practice in these circles to stroll into the most wholesome REI within a 10-mile radius, put on as many Arc’teryx jackets as possible and walk out. There’s a good article about it all here.
Arc’teryx becoming synonymous with this crowd would prove not to be great for businesses at the time, but whether they liked it or not, this unwanted PR was creating a mystique around the brand which would contribute to it’s desirability within the fashion world years later.
(c.2000) Delta LT Jersey
Not entirely ground-breaking, but influential in it’s own right, the Delta Jersey was Arc’teryx’s response to lifestyle outdoor apparrel that was gaining a foothold in the 2000s.
The Delta Jersey was designed as a high necked waffle knit with a cropped silhouette and unorthodox central Archaeopteryx, all making it immediately noticeable against both the stone & brick walls Arc’teryx wearers were often surrounded by.
The jersey was released in a host of bright colours and even a Polartec rendition, which would ultimately make it one of the most collectable non-performance items for the palaeontologists’ of the brand.
(c.2004 Sigma Fleece)
By the 2000s, Arc’teryx had long since passed their hard-shell examination with flying colours and so decided they would have a go at making soft ones, and if you’ve not figured it out by now, obviously this was also a resounding success.
The first venture into soft shells took the shape of a zip-up product named the Sigma Fleece. The most common iteration used GORE’s WINDSTOPPER material, making it an ideal product for those that ventured anywhere there was a slight breeze.
The Sigma Fleece was a no nonsense garment and came with nothing you didn’t need, essentially it was the apparel equivalent to Dave Lane’s original Rock Solid harness. Your dad would have purchased a Sigma Fleece in 2004, and still be wearing it now.
Present Day
The brand continued to be spotted almost exclusively on both outdoor enthusiasts and artistic vandals right up until the late 2010’s, when the brand gained much more widespread attention in the realm of ‘fashion.’ This explosion in popularity was spurred on by the likes of Frank Ocean, Virgil Abloh and other notable figures donning the dead bird.
The role of TikTok in the Arc’teryx craze cannot be understated, as the social media platform was home to all the people doing not graffiti and not outdoor stuff in their expensive products. So, what were they doing? Filming themselves in the shower wearing a $1500 jacket. Yeah, we haven’t quite got our heads around it either.
Despite the newfound stardom, Arc’teryx has not faltered in producing top notch products. The brand laid the foundations for their modern products very early on, testament to the design, functionality and innovativeness of their gear. Many of the items listed above are still produced now, with only minor changes and in slightly less dazzling colours. Which is a shame, if you ask us.
Of course the brand has also bolstered this roster, with the recent introduction of items like the Cerium, Thorium and Alpha Parka all continuing the legacy of Dave and Jeremy’s work.
To see where the Archaeopteryx has flown to now, we recommend taking a look at what’s on offer at SEVEN Store.
Fair Use Statement: This article contains images hosted without express permission from their copyright holders. These images are provided for illustration purposes to support an informational objective. This should constitute fair use of any such copyrighted material.
