Extreme Design
- Edited by Anniina Koivu
- Abitare 480 March 2008
As climbers in the 1960s ascended new routes that required multiple days to climb, it became imperative for them to find ways to sleep on the rock wall. Drawing from hammocks, cots, tents and sail construction, a generation of climber-designers invented a new typology: the portaledge. This archetype is liberated from the conventions of furniture design and its development took great ambition, courage and mental freedom. The design facilitates a radical form of life on earth and ascents that would be impossible with out it. The following historical information was gathered through interviews with Conrad Anker, Mike Graham and John Middendorf, climbers who were instrumental in the evolution of the portaledge over the last four decades.
1960s
Warren Harding invented the first hammock suspended from a central point, which he called a B.A.T. (Basically Absurd Technology) tent. Central suspension facilitates deployment and prevents the tipping that occurs with two-point hammocks. Harding almost died during his 1968 attempt on Half Dome, in Yosemite after being trapped in a threeday storm, where his B.A.T tent filled with freezing rain and snow.
1970s
Climbers Billy Westbay and Bruce Hawkins created the first portaledges by re-appropriating steel and canvas cots stolen from park lodges in Yosemite. These were a vast improvement from single-point hammocks with regard to comfort, but weighed up to thirty kilograms (almost three times the weight of today’s models). During this period climbers also used submarine ledges, made from U.S. Navy aluminum tube cots that had been purchased from army surplus stores. In 1972 the climber brothers Gregg and Jeff Lowe designed the LURP, a highly innovative portaledge prototype with the first collapsible frame. Mike Graham, a famous American climber, founded Gramicci in 1977, and made his Cliff Dwellings using equipment that he carried in his truck, and would set up his shop in friends? garages and basements. His minimal corner connections were an important innovation, but they also made the Cliff Dwelling vulnerable to structural failure under extreme forces of nature.
1980s
Fieldware Designs, a climber owned company, produced a chrome molly tube portaledge. Seperate 90 degree fittings solved earlier structural problems and have since become the standard connection for tube frames. In 1986 the bold American climber John Middendorf founded A5 Adventures. With strengthened 90? corner fittings and thicker tubing, the A5 portaledge was structurally superior to any previous design. The A5 fly tent was made from a 3-once Oxford fabric with a heavy-duty waterproof urethane coating. The fly’s construction was inspired by tepees and folded out of a complex pattern with a single seam. This was a great advantage for waterproofing.
1990s
With the advent of the portaledge, climbers began ascending big walls in alpine style, which refers to a continuous ascent, with all of one’s equipment. Prior to the portaledge, climbers had to climb in siege style, securing hundreds of meters of rope along their entire route and setting up multiple camps along the way. Middendorf’s double portaledge introduced Shark Fin fabric dividers between bed areas, which serve as connection points for three additional straps connecting the central axis of the bed canopy to the central suspension point. For the most extreme conditions, A5 designed and produced a Diamond Fly, which, as Graham’s Wind Shield prototype previously suggested, diverts upward winds from hitting the underside of the portaledge. During the Nineties, A5 was purchased by the California based outerwear company The North Face and later by climber Conrad Anker who renamed the company ACE.
2000s
Anker added protective bumpers to the frame, integrated pockets for drinks into the Shark Fins of double portaledges, and began anodizing the aluminium tubing. Today owned by Black Diamond, the A5/ACE designs are produced in China.
- Above: Photo Gordon Wiltsie
- Below: Photos Jean-Louis Wertz
