Back in the day, I used to shoot photography for Patagonia. There was a certain excitement to getting a catalog in the mail because it meant I had photos in it, one of my friends had photos in it or another one our friends were featured in it. When a catalog came in the mail it went like this: Run through the photos cover to cover, taking particular attention to the names that sit opposite the photo in the credit line.
Over the years, I fell out of the outdoor shooting world so the Patagonia catalogs don't hold quite as much importance anymore. Usually, my viewing session consists of flipping through it at the kitchen counter with the same tepid interest I have with any of the myriad of catalogs that land in our mailbox on a daily basis. The catalogs got smaller, the pare got thinner. The imagery began to feel a bit a little to staged in a lifestyle sense.
But today was different. Immediately, I noticed that the catalog was thicker and it had a flat binding on it. The paper was stiff and heavy. It felt like a journal, like a Surfer's Journal with distinct quality.
After flipping through the first few pages, I realized that this book was something unique. Instead of the same hyper-sharp photos of their ambassador athletes doing the same cool things that they do in their charmed lives of trotting around the globe...there were gritty, blurry, full bleed photos of the original gangsters goofing off with Fitz Roy in the background, the random butt shot that can only be created at a long, cold arduous belay, a stunning shot of a skier dropping an insane line in perfect light.
The kind of photos that make you want to take time to look at them, ponder the possibilities of what's going on and pull you back to a time when living in the back of a van was a viable way of life.
Before I knew it, I had gravitated over to my big comfy chair, sat down and started again from the beginning. Instead of flipping hastily through the catalog, I found myself soaking in the imagery shown in extra large size like it always had been back in the day. To round out this visual history lesson, Patagonia then tells their story, like its the foreword of a book.
Now that they told you who they are, they don't thrust you into a bunch of things that you think you need to look cool. They open with one of their signature stories about the core essence of why we love to play. Often it is a story of great suffering and regret which turns to reflection and enlightenment. Sometimes it is about the quest for achievement that gets derailed by mother nature. Its a story that anyone who has kissed death or been exhausted beyond measure knows all too well. Half of the people who read the stories know them like they've lived them and the other half dream of ever having the opportunity to be thrown into those situations.
Once I finally got to the product pages, they were bigger, brighter, enhanced with more negative space to give each garment its own pedestal to stand upon. Instead of a small tab that say Women's, Men's, Travel, each section was presented like it was its own chapter complimented with the powerful, realistic imagery to re-instill that this these products are designed to work 3500' up a frozen wall, so they'll work just fine on the sunny slopes of Vail.
Halfway through, Patagonia did what they have done forever, and told us another story of why we need to give a shit about the world around us. Even though this is a conduit of consumerism, they still display a social responsibility that they have embraced for 40 years as a company. Its thoughtful, its stimulating and reminds us that there are still a lot of problems that need to be dealt with. Many of these problems aren't necessarily out of our reach and fundamental changes in our own behavior can make differences.
As I closed the book with that historic picture of Chouinard's pins gracing the back cover. It felt nostalgic to hold a catalog that was reminiscent to what made the "Patagonia Catalog" such an iconic piece of outdoor culture for the last several decades.
I don't think Patagonia ever got away from their true style of making a good catalog. All of the elements described have always been there. They just got minimized by a recession, printing costs and market trends. It's a refreshing to see Patagonia come back to its roots of creating a picture book that deserves to be kept around a little longer and doesn't get discarded within hours of hitting the mailbox. It speaks to their culture, their philosophy and their product.
Thanks Patagonia for bringing us the Whole Enchilada.
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