Writing, reviews, interviews, photography.

Posts by A. Frankel

Meriwether Field Gear pt. 1

Posted on July 23, 2013

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A writeup on The American Classic about Meriwether Field Gear has been a long time coming. Danny reached out to me in April of this year to review some of his products. We’ve never reviewed home goods for the site before and though we have an immense appreciation for well crafted things, this was a new challenge to approach with a different mindset from looking at mens clothing. There’s a lot of great design happening right now, particularly in this sector, and getting a fresh look at this made me reexamine my own home and for that I am very thankful. Meriwether sent us their coat rack/personal organizer, classic six-pack carrier, cedar tree swing, and magnetic key ring holder and shelf. They sent us so much amazing stuff that we have to divide it into two segments in order to give it the attention it deserves. I sent half of the goods to Philly for Steve to try out, most notably that tree swing because if I so much as laid a hand on a tree here in California someone would murder me. In this review, we’ll be talking about the six pack carrier and coat rack. Click here to read the entire post.

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Summer Preview 2013

Posted on July 2, 2013

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Over the past month I’ve been shooting our Summer 2013 preview to relay some of the awesome stuff we’re releasing coming up later this season. As the weather’s gotten warmer we’ve steadily moved into full summer mode, frequently serving watermelon, drinking hoppy IPAs, and spending plenty of quality time outdoors. We’ll be traveling a bit of the Californian coastline and heading back east for a few visits and are excited to share those trips with you. This summer will see our first review of products made for the home. Meriwether Field Gear is an amazing shop in Montana that makes some really great wooden home goods that we’re excited to showcase as well as the continuation of our usual Weekend Adventures posts, a few shop visits, and the release of our second playlist (here’s the first in case you missed it). Stay tuned.

Weekend Adventures Vol. 2: Wittmore & Self Edge

Posted on June 4, 2013

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It’s getting hotter here in Los Angeles and while I’ve been cordoned mainly to the Santa Monica area for the past few weeks, there was some pretty rad stuff happening in the rest of the city that I couldn’t pass up. Kinfolk Magazine was hosting dinner parties (which I didn’t attend, sadly), plenty of great shows were happening around town, Wittmore had their popup shop near West Hollywood and it was high time to pay our friends at Self Edge a visit. I had a ratty pair of Left Field NYCs with a thinning crotch region and some nasty holes around the ankles as well as two matching blown out pockets (those bandanas don’t function nearly as spiffily as they look). Self Edge has a great deal at all locations where you bring in your wrecked (but clean) pair and for $40 flat they take care of fixing it up. I’ll report back once the repairs have been completed.

I’ve admired Wittmore’s online shop for some time as they always have a great selection of the a-typical when compared to plenty of other dude-focused web retailers. They’ve also got a great little feature that lets you search by geographic region of manufacture. Want shorts made in USA? No problem. Two clicks. Scarves made in England? Same story. It’s cool to see the similarities between products based upon region as you navigate through. It gives you a great perspective on regional manufacturing techniques and design principles. I heard they were doing their first brick-and-mortar pop-up in Los Angeles, of all places, and given that they’re headquartered in NYC, I figured the opportunity to meet and greet and check the wares in person wouldn’t present it self again soon. Click here to read the full article.

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Playlist: Summer Begins

Posted on June 4, 2013

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Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the very first American Classic playlist. I’m sure there’s a host of you expecting a smattering of classic tracks containing nothing newer than 1970 but you won’t find that here. No, instead what we’ve done is compiled our favorite tracks we’re listening to right now and stuck them into a Spotify playlist for your listening pleasure. We like Spotify because it’s flexible and makes things super easy for us to share things with you. If you want to shell out a little extra cash each month, you can get it’s incredible service on your mobile device and get rid of those ads. That being said, you’re still getting a pretty great deal by coping with the occasional Daft Punk ad in exchange for our playlist.

Not all of us live in Southern California and can have incredible beach weather all of the time. Steve (who designed this kick ass masthead, by the way) lives back in Philly and from what I can tell from speaking with him, it sounds like the rest of the country is getting a little bit warmer day by day. This might not be the playlist for the incredibly sticky days where your shirt sticks to you even in air conditioning and your dog literally refuses to move because it’s so hot, but this is to start easing you into the mindset of tequila, IPAs, ice cream, cool shade, lazy days, beater shoes, and ocean blues. For those of you who live outside of our weird and freakishly sunny paradise here in Los Angeles, here’s a little taste of summer that’s just around the corner. Click here to listen to the playlist.

Field Trip: Rising Sun & Co.

Posted on May 20, 2013

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I’ve known about Rising Sun for a surprising amount of time to have never visited them in person. I’ve spent years traveling across the country working on jobs in LA temporarily and noticed them when I used to visit friends in Pasadena and how incredible their shop looked. The American Classic wasn’t what it is now back then and I was lacking the confidence to galavant into a store, camera in tow, and start shooting. Rising Sun invited me out to their incredible workshop/retail space which has now moved to Eagle Rock, CA (not far from Pasadena and downtown Los Angeles) and I was more than happy to make the trek. Click here to read the full article.

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