Guest Giveaway

April 19, 2012

Words From George

George Guest is officially inviting you to join our first month-long giveaway contest this spring. With the launch of our new bag coming up, we wanted to take some time to get to know a little more about you and for you to get to know a little bit about us.

The Guest Giveaway will begin on Monday April 23, 2012. The great thing is that you can win a prize every week and it’s really simple to do so. Make sure to tag us on every Facebook post, include the hash tag #GuestGiveaway on every Tweet and include your full name and email address on every email you send in order to be eligible to win. Winners will be announced at the beginning of the following week through our Facebook and Twitter.

  • Week 1: Like us on Facebook and send your full name, Facebook link and Twitter handle to info@georgeguestusa.com in order to enter our giveaway contest
  • Week 2: Follow us on Twitter @GeorgeGuest and share where you would travel to if you won our premier product to win a lantern pendant. (Include hash tag #GuestGiveaway)
  • Week 3: Send your favorite travel picture/story/adventure etc. to travels@georgeguestusa.com to win a double wrap bracelet (minimum 200 words)
  • Week 4: Invite your friends and tag George Guest on the post to win our premier product: The Hillside Back Pack (sharing George Guest on Facebook or Twitter)

 

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Reason Outpost

December 26, 2011

Words From Alex

Coming from Boston we’re certainly quite familiar with our neighbors 200 miles to our south. While we may have differing views on the correct way to make clam chowder, the world’s best baseball team, and how to pronounce words like “water” and “car” our love for New York City runs deep. With numerous friends, family, and colleagues in New York, it’s been our goal since we started to work with a small, but influential group of retailers in and around Manhattan. We’re excited to now be selling our Hillside Packs along with our handmade bracelets and belts at Reason Outpost on 436 E. 9th Street in the East Village.

Founded in 2004, Reason is a full-fledged menswear brand taking their time to carefully grow and curate their collections over the years (something we can relate to). This past November they opened the doors to their flagship store modeled after the classic American general store. Interspersed with old painted signs, vintage home goods, and antique collectibles, you can find a variety of wares from exclusive Sebago boots and rare hunting jackets to Reason’s own in-house label and of course, George Guest Hillsides and accessories.

Reason Outpost harkens back to the classic American general store where you could get everything under one roof. While milk and eggs may not be available here, it’s certainly the place you want to be for a blend of vintage finds and quality modern brands.

Open daily from 12pm-8pm. 436 E. 9th Street, Manhattan, New York. www.reasonclothing.com

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Drinkwater’s Cambridge

December 7, 2011

Words From Alex

Since leaving Las Vegas (great movie), we’ve been working hard to get our products into select stores around the globe. Being from Boston, we began here and worked outwards, now selling as far away as Italy and Vancouver and as close as Cambridge, MA. Our goal is to find well-run and well-respected shops that reflect our values of quality and customer service. We’re excited to introduce you to those stores, as they’re all a bit unique in story and aesthetic. For full disclosure, our newest retailer and its owner is a close friend and mentor of ours and has helped us enormously on our journey. We’re proud and excited to announce we’ll be selling at Gary Drinkwater’s Cambridge menswear shop, Drinkwater’s, at 2067 Massachusetts Avenue in Porter Square (one of dozens of “squares” in the Boston area for outsiders).

Gary, a longtime Bostonian and retailer, carries a range of high quality, contemporary men’s brands from Engineered Garments, Universal Works and Penfield to American-made Bills Khakis, Southwick Suits, Catherine Joseph Outerwear and Drinkwater’s private label button downs (a staple for me as I move away from free college t-shirts and polos). Try as I might, I’ve never left his store without something in-hand as the colorful tie and sock table makes you feel like a kid in a toy store despite wearing a tie maybe three times a year.

Drinkwater’s has a very comfortable feel (the two leather lounge chairs do help this), and Gary’s discerning eye for style and friendly demeanor will leave you feeling like you got the VIP treatment. Currently you can find the Hillside Pack along side many other quality, often handmade, accessories and clothes. We wholeheartedly recommend checking out Drinkwater’s next time you’re in the Boston area, maybe for a sweater, maybe for a suit, maybe for a backpack.

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Man’s Best Friend

October 31, 2011

Words From George

Since we first started offering leather accessories on our website, custom orders have been rolling in for everything from camera straps to kindle cases. We do our best to work with every new request because it gives us a chance test new ideas that come directly from you guys. Its fun, we learn a lot from you, and sometimes it results in a product that we end up selling on our website.

Wallace, a 2-year-old Pitbull (Staffordshire Terrier when the landlady comes around) was our inspiration behind the first shot at a GG dog collar. First, however, I wanted to test out the design on my current studiomate Turk, an 8-month-old Pot-Cake (a breed of dogs from the Turks and Caikos islands). Two close friends of mine recently adopted him and couldn’t find a collar that fit him well so I got to work. It was a great chance to test the idea before creating version 2.0 for Wallace, the unofficial GG Mascot since 2009. Wallace has been a solid office companion over the past 2 years and now with our new space in Newport, RI (pictures to come soon) Turk has accepted some of those responsibilities. Both pups bring good energy to the office and remind us how to lay back and relax after a long day. Wallace is also the ideal vehicle for testing how well our leather breaks in and holds up in intense conditions as he lives his life by the “work hard, play hard” mantra.

We are in the process of setting up the studio that Turk will help oversee in the same way Wallace does in the city. It’s great to have K9 companions in both locations that proudly rep their GG gear. Let us know if you have any pets that are itching for a GG collar or if you have any new ideas of your own. Stay tuned for some new products and an upcoming post on our new studio space.

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George Guest I PROJECT 10

August 31, 2011

Words From George Guest

For a young brand like George Guest it’s always been exciting to introduce our products to new and different people. One of the best ways to do that (and find new retailers) is to participate in a tradeshow. We were lucky enough to be invited by our friends at Selectism and PROJECT to participate in PROJECT 10, an initiative for 10 up-and-coming brands to showcase their wares, in our case our bags.

Bags packed and anticipation boiling over, we shot out to Las Vegas’ Mandalay Bay to be one of over 900 brands showing their Spring collections. We were given prime real estate right on the corner of the main “avenue” (being across from the Women’s brands wasn’t to bad either). Our fellow P10 brands all embodied the “tailored performance” theme of PROJECT 10 and shared our goal of creating innovative and high quality products. Some of our favorites of P10: Outlier, TAD, Poler, A Kind of Guise, Mors Footwear, and Lunettes Kollektion all of which we wholeheartedly recommend checking out.

It was great meeting some of the industry’s most innovative and creative brands like the Brooklyn Circus crew who continue to impress, Shwood with all wooden sunglasses, and Penfield who’s Spring collection is chock-full of must-haves. We’d like to especially thank Andrew Pollard, Nancy Berger, and Gavin Logan of Project for helping us to have such a great show; Jeff Carvalho and Nick Schonberger of Selectism for inviting us to be apart of P10; and Marcus Troy, The Madbury Club, and the whole Blogger Project for swinging by the display and taking some great pictures.

Our only regret? We waited until our departure to gamble at the airport. We left Vegas $3 down.

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Alaska: The Last Frontier

July 20, 2011

Words From Alex

What better place to get away from the city for a week and test the Hillside’s rugged side than “The Last Frontier”?  This past week my brother and I headed up to Anchorage, Alaska to visit some family and explore the wilderness a bit (the salmon jerky and great local craft beer were added perks.)

We took a late flight into Anchorage, only to be greeted with Reindeer meatloaf, Midnight Sun Brewing Mop Top IPA (highly recommended), and a sun that didn’t want to set (it was 10:30pm). The fact that the sun rose at about 4am and “set” at 2am (and by set I mean it never got darker than dusk) took some adjusting. It also made for long days, allowing us to pack in hiking, kayaking, eating, biking, fishing, and drinking all before darkness set in around 2am.

We left Anchorage and drove due South to Homer, the self-proclaimed Halibut capital of the world-the fish tacos were good… In Homer, or more specifically “Otter Cove” on the Kachemak Bay, we set out to explore the surrounding mountains, waters, and wildlife. Hillside packed up to the brim and bear bells in hand my uncle, cousin, brother, and I hiked Grace Ridge about 3,000 feet before going off trail for the final 500 feet. There’s something to be said about having a snowball fight in the middle of June overlooking glaciers, mountains, and rivers as far as you can see.

The trip continued on to Seward, Whittier, Valdez, and a quick trip up to Talkeetna to check out the mouth of Denali (surreal). Alaska is a place I’d highly recommend to anyone looking for a little adventure. The photographs you see in National Geographic are commonplace in AK; bald eagles, salmon, black bears, oilman and fisherman, puffins, and of course picturesque mountains. The Hillside successfully navigated the overgrown trails and defended against the wildlife of Alaska. We look forward to sharing with you our next adventure where ever it may be.

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Leather Essentials

June 8, 2011

Words From George

As we began to get a better grasp on the type of brand George Guest would be, there came a time when it made sense to start incorporating leather into Hillside prototypes.  This meant that I had to start working with a material that I knew little about.  Thankfully, leather has a few similarities with wood in that they can both be carved and shaped with a knife; a tool that has been a staple for me as a designer since day one.  After a few trips to the factory, I picked up new ways to work with leather.  I practiced with scraps when I wasn’t working on the Hillside and I quickly figured out what tools created a cleaner final product.  Since I was working mainly with parts of the hide left over from prototyping, it made sense to design smaller accessories.  Belts, bracelets, camera cases, and key chains were all things I needed personally and I knew I could easily test them over the course of a normal day.  Just like the Hillside, I carried these accessories with me everyday, testing and tweaking along the way.  The belts and bracelets we are offering now are two of these products that we have tested and redesigned to the point where we are ready to offer them to you.  All of them are hand cut and stitched in Massachusetts and only get better with use.  There are plenty more accessories in the works so stay tuned for more to come.

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Welcome

May 16, 2011

Words From George Guest

Welcome to our new website and News section; we’re excited you’ve found us! For those of you who don’t know who we are, we’ve been working for the past four years on George Guest and our premier Hillside Backpack. We’ve been lucky enough to meet a lot of great people along the way and we’re excited to share our products with you.

In this section we’ll keep you updated on new products, retailers, stories, and any other adventures we may find ourselves in. We are also interested in seeing where you take your GG gear. We’ll be posting pictures of the places the Hillside has found itself.  We love to travel and so do our products.

George Guest arose from a basic personal need and has since evolved. We pride ourselves on designing products that improve travel and turn heads along your journey.  While it might work for some, all form with no function doesn’t fly with us. We’re confident that our attention to detail, and balance between function and style, sets us apart. This is just the beginning and we’re excited that you will be a part of George Guest as we grow.

 

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Evolution of the Hillside

April 29, 2011

Words From George

Four years ago this summer, I pieced together the original Hillside on a borrowed sewing machine.  It consisted of old backpack parts, tent fabric and anything else I could pirate from my camping gear.  Years later, after creating and destroying a dozen prototypes, the design had evolved into a product we were ready to bring to market.  I have learned a lot along the way and I am proud to bring you the newest Hillside.

From the start, my only goal was to create a bag that proved the roll-top concept could work.  It didn’t matter what the bag looked like. Once the original prototype was done, I realized that the design’s unique functionality would dictate how the rest of the bag would take shape.  Canvas and leather were aesthetic decisions at first, but they ended up giving the bag much more structure than nylon.  Side pockets arose out of the need for quick access to a subway pass in the city or a passport on trips to the factory.  When you wear your company on your back every day its easy to pick the next features.  At George Guest, we try to take this approach with all of our new projects. Rather than base our designs on what already exists in the marketplace, we start fresh with a unique idea and build our products from the ground up, testing them everyday along the way.

 

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The Concrete Jungle: Boston

December 10, 2010

Words From Alex

This past July we were lucky enough to open an end of the Summer/Fall pop-up shop on Boston’s premier Newbury St. Joining forces with three other up-and-coming Boston brands we combined our networks, experiences, and differing perspectives to create “The Concrete Jungle: Boston,” featuring a variety of clothes, accessories, shoes, and art. Opening our own retail space proved to be both extremely challenging and fun. Despite some tax questions, credit card machine issues, and the occasional unruly customer we not only had a blast, but also met some great people.

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