Visit to Helinox and DAC HQs in Seoul Korea!

 Visiting Helinox and DAC in Seoul Korea!

like most overseas trips, this one started with the classic traveler's breakfast: a scone and a strong cup of coffee (in this case a triple shot-in-the-dark)

It's great beta, flying over the Rockies, checking out the terrain below for future trips...

Denver (left), Mount Evans (far right)

Grand Mesa overlooks Grand Junction (right), Powderhorn ski resort (left of center)

...and it can be a little depressing seeing the devastation from the oil and gas industry. 

each of these clearings is several acres in size but they have just one tiny well per clearing. obviously there was no thought to minimize impact or road cuts - they just trashed this entire mesa top

But I digress

Got into Seoul late and such was my state that I could only marvel at the vast array of buttons in the elevator. Oooooooooo

The Dormy Inn

Sweeping breakfast buffet

On the drive to DAC & Helinox, I can see the 5th tallest building in the world in the distance but can't get a decent photo.  It's TALL. These are normal...

Always building in Seoul

the crane business must be insane

This trip's first meeting with my good friend Jake Lah, owner of DAC.

I first met Jake in the early 90's, looking for new tent poles for Kelty (I was the Kelty designer). During our first meeting Jake showed me two sketchbooks filled with tent designs. He was a tent designer, not just a pole maker. We used his poles immediately and it became clear that it was his desire to make new and better tents that drove his pole innovations. Now some 25-odd years later, it's simply a fact that Jake has been the inventor of the vast majority of the tent innovations the world's tent markets have seen. 

We talked a lot (as we do).

Jake next to his first non-tentpole project - the project that gave Helinox its name - telescopes with super-sophisticated controls (before everyone else did it)

Helinox time!

the Helinox Creative Center

my host, Young Lah, owner of Helinox, with one of his managers, Jenn

cots and chairs

tone-y digs

cot print: baroque?

cot print: just plain out there

cot print: Mexican surrealist 

I love it: the fabric is almost like a rug

cozy chairs

more plush rug fabric on a chair - I like it

cup holder with hula tassels. your cup holder doesn't have hula hassles? really?

more kinds of poles than anyone thought. my favorite's the Causway GL145 (not just beCAUSe of the name)

LINE FRIENDS: Sally & Brown

Just in time for the Helinox Users Group (HUG) gathering for the launch of the LINE FRIENDS line.

The winners of the Helinox calendar contest had their photos on display on the third floor 

very different with a crowd of people in the room

Jake enjoyed the photo exhibit

Meetings done, it's time to get back and glue myself to the computer once again...