No matter how great a vehicle is, sometimes, the darn things just don’t sell. Maybe they struggle to resonate or find a niche. Maybe they’re priced beyond the reach of those interested. Maybe they’re just the wrong body style — sup, big sedans and station wagons — at the wrong time.
Whatever the reason, here are 14 awesome cars that no one bought in 2023. Amongst the list you’ll find several of the vehicles that, quite frankly, you’d expect to see on there; that said, there was also one big surprise that seriously made us do a double take.
Note: our definition of “no one” in this application means the car sold fewer units than the Toyota Mirai, a hydrogen car only sold in California. That number for 2023 was 2,737.
Ford GT
Eric Perry Photography
Units sold in 2023: 31
The Ford GT, a $500,000-ish supercar built by the Ford Motor Company, has a small pool of buyers. And if you’re among that small pool that’s interested … you likely already own one.
The current Godzilla generation has been in production since 2007. It actually had a surprising sales renaissance in 2023 … but that still amounted to less than 400 units.
The days of supercars being powered by high-revving internal combustion are fleeting. Sadly, the R8’s eventual successor — when it finally arrives — will be an electric car.
The current generation of Lexus’s smaller sports coupe is getting up there after debuting in 2014. It lacks a bit of modern sophistication, but it still looks great.
The LC is a spring chicken by Lexus standards, having debuted in 2017. It looks great, feels luxurious — and it still packs a resonant, naturally-aspirated V8. Sadly, that doesn’t seem to have done much for buyers.
Nissan’s new Z launched with great fanfare a couple years back, but delays and hiccups have severely limited its availability since. If production improves, will buyers come running? We’ll find out in 2024.
The Z4 is BMW’s counterpart to the Toyota Supra. The German brand is adding a manual option for 2024 to boost interest; here’s hoping it also boosts sales. The world is too short on convertables as it is.
If you want to go fast, stretch your legs and keep things subtle in the looks department, there aren’t many better options out there than Audi’s full-size sedan.
BMW unveiled a garish, M division-built super PHEV called the XM in 2022. Then a new “XM Label” edition came along, and literally put lipstick on a pig. We suspect a lot of buyers will be waiting for that powertrain to show up in an M5.
VW’s pricey, decidedly un-sporty midsize sedan has a lot to offer. Unfortunately, buyers in America have never been interested — perhaps due to its Audi-like price.
The GR Supra was a surprising one to make this list. Toyota added a manual to presumably broaden its appeal … yet sales plummeted 46 percent year over year. (Maybe word is out that awful wind buffeting at speed?)
However, one electric vehicle you’d expect Toyota to build — a super-affordable electric take on the Corolla — may not be coming anytime soon. Andrea Carlucci, Toyota’s European head of product development, recently told Autocar that the brand had no plans to offer a super-affordable (~$25,000) EV along the lines of what Tesla has proposed. He noted that doing so would require a “substantial shift in the cost of batteries.”
Toyota’s Urban SUV, expected to start at around $40,000 in Britain, is expected to be Toyota’s cheapest EV. We suspect Toyota’s upcoming EV offerings will slot above the bZ4X, which currently starts at $43,070.
The Toyota Urban SUV concept.Toyota
Toyota not making a super-cheap EV right now isn’t that surprising
Impressive as Toyota’s engineers and product planners are, they aren’t miracle workers. Building a truly affordable EV would be tough for them because, well, the price of batteries means affordable EVs don’t really exist yet — and probably won’t exist in America for some time. Chevy discontinued the Bolt EV at the end of 2023. The cheapest EV that offers enough range to not considered as a “city car” in America (in other words, offering comfortably over 200 miles on a charge) is the 2024 Hyundai Kona EV, which offers 261 miles of range starting at $32,675.
Toyota
But Toyota is working on the technology to build super-cheap EVs … eventually
Toyota aims to spearhead the required “substantial shift in the cost of batteries.” The carmaker has made headlines with plans to offer solid-state batteries that could eventually top 900 miles of range, nbut equally vital for Toyota will be the brand’s so-called “Popularization” effort that uses new lithium-iron-phosphate batteries. Per Toyota, the new batteries will offer 20 percent more range than the bZ4X (so, around 300 miles) while also being 40 percent cheaper to produce.
And Toyota already offers a great, cheap, fuel-efficient alternative to an EV
While Toyota was slow-playing on EVs, it was developing hybrid tech — and the brand’s current batch of hybrids are some of the best on the market. The new Prius, just named North American Car of the Year, offers 57 mpg in city driving starting at just $27,950. You can level up to a plug-in hyrid Prius Prime, now offering 44 miles of EV-only range, for just $32,975.
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You’ve almost certainly tried Fireball before. The cinnamon-flavored liqueur from Canada, which bills itself as “Cinnamon Whisky,” has become one of the top-selling liquors in the United States over the past decade. Known for its fire demon-emblazoned bottle and Atomic FireBall candy-like taste, the spicy spirit has recently been in the news over a lawsuit alleging that Fireball doesn’t actually contain whiskey at all.
So what does all of this mean? Is Fireball whiskey or not? Read on to find out everything you need to know about the Fireball whiskey controversy.
There are actually two different products marketed as Fireball. The flagship product, and the one you’ll find all over the brand’s website and social media channels, is Fireball Cinnamon Whisky. It’s a 33% ABV (66-proof) liqueur made with a mix of Canadian whiskey, sweeteners and natural cinnamon flavoring. But is it whiskey? Well, no, not really. Technically speaking, once you add sugar to a spirit and lower its ABV it becomes a liqueur rather than a spirit.
Fireball Cinnamon Whisky is one of the most popular hard alcohol products in the US — but does it deserve to be called whiskey?Fireball
But this is a semantics game, and one not exclusive to Fireball. When you hear “coconut rum,” you probably think of Malibu. But Malibu isn’t technically a rum — it’s a rum-based coconut-flavored liqueur with an ABV of just 21%. Fireball Cinnamon Whisky does contain real whiskey, so it’s not unreasonable to categorize it as such. The problem arises once you get to Fireball’s other product, Fireball Cinnamon.
What Is Fireball Cinnamon?
Fireball Cinnamon is the newer sibling to Fireball Cinnamon Whisky. It’s sold in a nearly-identical bottle, with the only real difference being the absence of “Whisky” in the name on the label. But the product inside is not identical. Fireball Cinnamon contains no whiskey at all. Instead, it’s a malt liquor flavored with sweeteners and natural whiskey flavor, along with other natural flavors (like cinnamon). It’s also half as strong as Fireball Cinnamon Whisky, rating at just 33 proof as opposed to 66 proof. So why does this product exist?
At first glance, the Fireball Cinnamon and Fireball Cinnamon Whisky labels are nearly indistinguishable. Sazerac
Fireball created Fireball Cinnamon so they could sell their product in more places. Laws dictating alcohol sales vary greatly by state, and many areas allow for sales of beer and wine in more stores than hard liquors like whiskey. Since malt beverages are classified with beer and wine, that means Fireball Cinnamon can be sold at many more locations than Fireball Cinnamon Whisky — about 170,000 more in the US, according to Fireball’s FAQ page. That’s why you might see mini bottles of Fireball at the checkout station of your local gas station, even if it’s illegal for the store to sell whiskey. What you’re seeing is Fireball Cinnamon.
Why Is Fireball Being Sued?
In January 2023, a Chicago woman named Anna Marquez filed a lawsuit against the parent company of Fireball, The Sazerac Company, alleging fraud. According to The New York Times, Marquez purchased a bottle of Fireball Cinnamon, expecting to receive a whiskey-based libation. Instead, she discovered that what she had purchased was ultimately a malt liquor-based beverage that contained no whiskey at all.
The crux of the lawsuit comes down to two issues. One is the near-identical appearance of bottles of Fireball Cinnamon Whisky to Fireball Cinnamon. The other is what the lawsuit considers misleading language on the label of Fireball Cinnamon, which describes the product as a “malt beverage with natural whisky and other flavors and caramel color.” The drink does not contain any whiskey and instead contains “natural whisky flavor,” which the lawsuit believes could be made clearer on the label.
In March of 2023, Fireball’s parent company, Sazerac Co., responded to the lawsuit by claiming that the plaintiffs had no standing to file the lawsuit and by stating that the bottle designs were not confusing, according to Bloomberg. A few months after that, Marquez and her attorneys voluntarily dropped their complaint, according to Illinois Assistant Attorney General John P. Moynihan. But that doesn’t mean Fireball is out of the woods.
There have actually been multiple lawsuits filed on similar grounds against Sazerac, and while Marquez’s got the most media attention, a nearly identical case in California may actually make it to trial. Christopher McKay of Potter Valley, CA sued Sazerac in February 2023 after he purchased Fireball Cinnamon at a gas station believing it to be Fireball Cinnamon Whisky. In May of 2023, the most recent update on the case I could find, U.S. District Judge Edward Chen denied Sazerac’s motion to dismiss the case, stating that Fireball Cinnamon’s label “could affirmatively mislead consumers” and agreeing that McKay had standing to file the suit.
What About Fireball Dragon Reserve?
In June of 2023, Fireball launched Dragon Reserve — billed as the brand’s “first bourbon barrel-aged whiskey.” This version of Fireball spends several months aging in spent bourbon barrels before being bottled, resulting in a slightly smoother spirit. But don’t let the hype fool you: The liquid being aged is the same 66-proof Fireball Cinnamon Whisky; it’s just been aged in some barrels. That process doesn’t magically transform it into a proper whiskey; it’s still by definition a liqueur.
Fireball Dragon Reserve is the same as regular Fireball, just with an extra step in the aging process.Johnny Brayson
If I want cinnamon whiskey, what should I drink instead?
Cinnamon whiskey — which, in almost all cases, is really whiskey-based liqueurs flavored with cinnamon or cinnamon flavoring — is not exactly the kind of beverage that whiskey connoisseurs get excited about. But if you’re in the mood for a little extra heat, these non-Fireball cinnamon whiskeys — all of which are made with real whiskey — make for some great alternatives.
If what you’re looking for is a straight-up bourbon with a hint of cinnamon flavor, then Litchfield has got you covered. The Connecticut-based craft whiskey distillery infuses straight bourbon with Indonesian cinnamon sticks and then bottles the result at a hefty 86 proof. A lot less sweet than other options on the market, this tastes more like real cinnamon spice than candy.
For a happy medium between Fireball-like cinnamon liqueurs and whiskey-infused bourbon, there’s Cooperstown’s Spitball Cinnamon Whiskey. This is a whiskey-based liquor from the New York distillery that’s bottled stronger and less syrupy than Fireball, with 35% ABV and 50% less sugar. It’s also infused with three different types of cinnamon, leading to a more complex tasting experience.
If you’re looking to stick with something in the realm of Fireball but done in (arguably) a better way, try Jim Beam’s Kentucky Fire. Many big-name American whiskey brands have their own Fireball competitor these days, like Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Fire and Evan Williams Fire (they’re all really into fire), but Beam does it best. Kentucky Fire is 70 proof and is described as “cinnamon liqueur infused with Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey.” As a result, it’s sweet and full of cinnamon candy flavor, but is notable for also providing some actual bourbon tasting notes to go along with it.
Show a little love with John Hardy this Valentine’s Day
John Hardy
Presented ByJohn Hardy
Published
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Updated
John Hardy has made a name for itself by crafting high-quality jewelry from 100 percent reclaimed sterling silver and gold.
Now, the brand has launched its newest assortment of Love Knot styles in a wide range of materials: sterling silver, blackened silver, yellow gold and with diamond detailing. Never heard of the best-selling Love Knot? John Hardy ties separately woven chains together by hand to craft an infinity knot — a symbol of love, resilience and romance.
There’s a wide range of pieces to choose from: The Love Knot Ring ($395) is a beautiful chunky statement ring that’s available in silver and gold, and the stunning Love Knot Bracelet ($1,795) is an elegant piece that adds a bit of glamour to any wrist. So what are you waiting for? Shop the Love Knot collection today.
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Today in Gear is our daily roundup of all the latest product announcements, drops and news from Gear Patrol Studios.
John Hardy
Presented ByJohn Hardy
Published
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Norwegian AI startup 1X Technologies AS has released a new android, Neo, which is designed to help people with everyday tasks but looks like a faceless bad guy you might encounter in a dystopian-themed nightmare. Maybe the latter is our hot take because it hasn’t cooled interest in 1X, which raised $100 million in funding on Neo’s back. The brand says it “designs androids that work alongside people, to meet the world’s labor demands,” and specifically built Neo with a humanoid figure citing benefits like the ability to communicate nonverbally. Is Neo is the stuff of nightmares or a catalyst for a more leisure-filled future? Only time will tell.
Today we’re taking a look at new Love Knot jewelry, a “self-flying camera,” a sleek tumbler aimed at the après-ski crowd and more. This is Today in Gear.
Today in Gear is our daily roundup of all the latest product announcements, drops and news from Gear Patrol Studios. Send your most pressing product questions to [email protected].
Shop the Love Knot Collection
John Hardy
Never heard of the best-selling Love Knot? John Hardy ties separately woven chains together by hand to craft an infinity knot — a symbol of love, resilience and romance. There’s a wide range of pieces to choose from: The Love Knot Ring ($395) is a beautiful chunky statement ring that’s available in silver and gold, and the stunning Love Knot Bracelet ($1,795) is an elegant piece that adds a bit of glamour to any wrist. So what are you waiting for? Shop the Love Knot collection today.
Smartwool launched a suite of brand-new items built with Intraknit Active technology, which combines merino wool (and all of its natural thermoregulating properties) with a 3D knit designed to increase breathability. The Active Fleece Tights ($72) are made with a brushed merino wool for an extra-soft next-to-skin feel. That same cozy fabric is used in the Active Fleece Insulated Glove ($36).
Highland Duds is an LGBTQ+ owned small business that produces an array of ethically made jackets and apparel. This means they create in small batches and in family-owned factories. We love the Varsity Wool Bomber Jacket ($268) and the classic Forecaster Jacket ($168).
The go-anywhere 3-in-1 Serpa Tumbler ($42) from SMMT can hold all of your favorite beverages, from your morning coffee to your aprè-ski drink of choice. The canister is insulated stainless steel and has a nested sipping lid and a leakproof top. The Serpa comes in three colors: Dreamscape Blue, Moonlit Carbon and Aspen White.
It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s a … self-flying camera? That’s what Hover has coined its HoverAir X1 (from $349). We’d call it a pocket-sized drone aimed at the vlogging crowd equipped with five smart flight modes: follow, hover, zoom out, bird’s eye and orbit. The fully enclosed design means that you’ll never catch a propeller to the finger again.
Growing up in the ’90s and ’00s (read: before cannabis was legal anywhere), there was really only one kind of weed (perhaps there were different strains, but most folks couldn’t access them nor tell the difference). And if it got you high, that was great.
While cannabis is still federally illegal, the regional legality (and the legal loopholes therein) have resulted in some unique changes, including an expansion of our understanding of THC, the chemical compound in cannabis responsible for the psychoactive effects on the human body and its isomers.
You may have heard of some of these —Delta-9, Delta-8, THCv, etc — but you might not know what they are or what they mean. With that in mind, we’ve broken down the most common types, including what they are and (perhaps most importantly) whether or not they’ll get you high.
What, Exactly, Is THC?
Short for tetrahydrocannabinol, THC is a naturally occurring chemical compound found in the cannabis plant. It is also the principal psychoactive component of the plant, responsible for causing a collection of symptoms in the human body. Together, these feelings or symptoms result in feeling high or stoned. It is also the chemical used in the medical application of cannabis to treat nausea and vomiting in chemotherapy patients and has been used to stimulate appetite in patients with anorexia (as is common with AIDS patients), among other uses.
Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol is the most common, naturally occurring version of this chemical, but there are now several different isomers — also known as chemical variants — all with different names and, in many cases, slightly varying effects when applied to the human body.
The most typical ways to ingest THC are through smoking, vaping and ingesting.
What are Isomers and Homologues?
As defined by Merriam-Webster, an isomer is “one of two or more compounds, radicals, or ions that contain the same number of atoms of the same elements but differ in structural arrangement and properties.” In simple terms, isomers are chemicals that are extremely similar to one another but may differ in a number of ways.
For instance, Delta-9 is the most common version of THC and can cause a person to feel high. Delta-8 is an isomer of THC that, while similar, has been reported to have less of a psychoactive effect on the human body, meaning it requires people to ingest greater amounts to feel the same effects as Delta-9. This is not necessarily how all isomers function, but it is a good example of how they might differ.
A homologue, similarly, is a molecule that may function similarly to another — in our case, delta-9 THC’s homologues include THCv, THCA and THC-O-acetate (THCv and THCa are natural homologues, while THC-O-acetate is a synthetic homologue) — but may have a different number of atoms.
In short, all the different types of THC are still THC at their base level. They just have slightly different effects on the human body when consumed and may have differing chemical or molecular structures.
These are the most common types of THC isomers, including whether they’re legal for consumption and if they’ll get you high.
Delta-9 THC
Will It Get You High: Yes
As mentioned, Delta-9 THC is the most common type of THC found in cannabis and the standard by which all other types of THC are measured. It is also the kind of THC you should expect to find when you buy flower from a dispensary in a state or territory where cannabis is legalized.
Delta-8 THC
Will It Get You High: Yes, but slightly less than Delta-9
Like Delta-9, Delta-8 THC is a naturally occurring chemical component in the cannabis plant and has psychoactive effects on the human body. Unlike Delta-9, however, Delta-8 is found in much smaller amounts in cannabis. Most Delta-8 THC is derived from hemp, as opposed to marijuana (“hemp” is the term for cannabis with a low amount of psychoactive THC [<0.3% THC content by dry weight], whereas “marijuana” is the term associated with cannabis that has high concentrations of psychoactive THC), where it exists in larger quantities. As mentioned above, Delta-8 THC is not FDA approved — which is not necessarily a mark against it, so much as it is a comment on the fact that governmental entities have not yet researched Delta-8 THC in depth.
Delta-10 THC
Will It Get You High: Yes, but slightly less than Delta-9
Similar to Delta-8, Delta-10 THC is a naturally occurring chemical found in the cannabis plant, albeit in small doses. It also can have psychoactive effects on the human body, though it is reportedly not as powerful as Delta-9. There has been less research done on the effects of Delta-10 on the human body than both Delta-9 and Delta-8, and it is less regulated than both.
THCv
Will It Get You High: Yes, in large doses
Short for tetrahydrocannabivarin, THCv is commonly referred to as “diet weed” or “weederall” and has been purported to actually curb appetites and boost energy — though these claims may be dubious, and the surrounding research is primarily conducted through animal testing. In large quantities, THCv may also produce psychoactive effects, though at much smaller levels than the other forms of THC on this list.
THCa
Will It Get You High: No
Unlike the rest of the THC derivatives on this list, THCa is actually a chemical precursor to THC. Short for tetrahydrocannabinolic acid, this chemical does not have any psychoactive effects on the human body, as it does not bind to CB1 receptors in the human body (unlike these other forms of THC). However, when exposed to light and heat, THCa will decarboxylate into THC — a process that is all but inevitable.
THC-O-acetate
Will It Get You High: Yes, even in small doses
A semi-synthetic compound derived from natural THC, there are many claims that suggest that THC-O-acetate is stronger than traditional, natural forms of THC and that it might even produce psychedelic-like effects in the human body. However, studies suggest that this is either partially or entirely false. While little research has been done on this semi-synthetic form of THC, it is possible that there are greater risks in consuming it due to the chemicals and processes involved in its creation.
Other THC Types
While the above represent the most common, well-researched forms of THC, they’re not the only kinds (and more are likely to emerge as cannabis research continues). Another emerging type is THCp (tetrahydrocannabiphorol) — another recently discovered naturally-occurring THC homologue that is not currently commercially available (though there are black-market products that claim to contain it [even though they don’t]) but shows promise in vitro and animal studies when it comes to its potency (and, transitively, the high it produces). Another is THC Chirality, which is an isomer of THC that could potentially pose public health concerns in the future.
As always, make sure you check your local laws and regulations before attempting to purchase any type of cannabis.
This article was fact-checked by Dr. Matthew Elmes — a cannabinoid scientist and cannabis enthusiast. His professional background spans both academia and the cannabis industry. He currently works as Director of an analytical cannabis testing laboratory in New York.
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Carabiners are cool. They’ve been around since — well, we’re not sure. The history is murky. Sometime between the late 1800s and the 1930s, carabiners were invented by someone, somewhere, and they’ve been iterated upon ever since. The multifunctional clips really took off in the US when Patagonia founder (and avid climber) Yvon Chouinard began selling his own designs in the late ’60s. Nowadays, carabiners are everywhere: cheap ones at gas stations, high-quality, belay-ready ones in climbing shops, and all kinds across the internet.
Today, we’re examining a new carabiner on the block — one that’s not even out yet. Meet the Urbanix Titanium Alloy EDC Multifunctional Tool Keychain 2.0 (aka the Urbanix), a new Kickstarter-funded multi-tool carabiner keychain from a Hong Kong-based brand that’s got some handy features and weighs less than an unsharpened pencil.
Products in the Guide
Urbanix Titanium Alloy EDC Multi Tool Keychain 2.0
According to its Kickstarter page, this tool was “born out of the pursuit of practicality and portability.” That’s pretty standard language for any small multi-tool, but as we move on to its actual construction, things get interesting. The Urbanix is made from a single piece of machined TC4, grade 5 titanium; rather than relying on the traditional carabiner clip mechanism, the Urbanix Titanium Alloy EDC Multifunctional Tool Keychain 2.0 utilizes a flexible spring-type gate machined from the same block of metal as the rest of the tool.
Teeny-tiny, but mighty thanks to a CNC-machined titanium construction. Kickstarter
Although it weighs roughly the same amount as six one-dollar bills, the Urbanix manages to pack five basic tools into its design: a bottle opener, hex wrench, emergency knife, Phillips screwdriver and flat screwdriver, with the hex wrench doubling as a keyring holder.
The Urbanix measures 35.5mm by 21.5 mm, which is about the same size as a US postage stamp. Its tiny silhouette is a double-edged sword; it’ll be incredibly easy to carry around, and won’t weigh your belt loop, backpack or pocket down. However, we imagine it’ll be tricky to actually use the included tools given their diminutive size, and it could be very easy to misplace.
You can secure the Urbanix now by pledging $30 — a steal for a titanium anything. (It has already raised more than 12 times it’s incredibly modest goal with 22 days to go.) If you miss the initial Kickstarter round, the base price for the tool is $49.
Kickstarter
Urbanix Titanium Alloy EDC Multi Tool Keychain 2.0
Today in Gear is our daily roundup of all the latest product announcements, drops and news from Gear Patrol Studios
MiHIGH
Presented ByMiHigh
Published
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OpenAI just introduced the GPT Store. GPT stands for Generative Pre-Trained Transformers, and the company says that in the two months since it announced GPTs, users have created a staggering three million custom versions of ChatGPT. The GPT store allows you to explore and use them. Think: personalized trail recommendations from AllTrails, help finding your next book or the ability to search the results from millions of academic papers. Every week the store will feature cool new GPTs to check out.
Today we’re taking a look at a new hybrid tool, a mocktail kit and ab infrared sauna blanket. This is Today in Gear.
Today in Gear is our daily roundup of all the latest product announcements, drops and news from Gear Patrol Studios. Send your most pressing product questions to [email protected].
An Infrared Sauna Blanket
MiHIGH
Introducing the perfect cold-weather solution: the Infrared Sauna Blanket V2 ($599) from MiHigh. Slip into the lightweight bag and let the stresses of the world melt away. From detoxification, stress reduction, clearer skin and better sleep, infrared heat has been proven to help your health and well-being. You’ll burn 300 to 600 calories persession, and help your body and muscles recover at the same time. Other benefits include an overall sense of calm that lasts well after your session ends. Right now, you can get 20% off sitewide.
Sonderhaus delivers The Wool Gwendolyn Pant ($98), which is an elevated sweatpant that hits that great balance between being comfortable at home and looking presentable when venturing out. The pants are made from 100 percent merino wool and are cut in a loose, wide-leg style. If you’re looking for a full suit, then pair it with a matching Wool Gwendolyn Sweater ($120). Both items come in a grey, cream, coffee and bright cobalt blue color.
A new collaboration between Swatch and Blancpain has yielded a real stunner: the Ocean of Storms watch is the sixth watch in the ‘Bioceramic Scuba Fifty Fathoms Collection.’ It’s a true diver’s watch — inspired by the largest lunar sea — and it’s powered by the SISTEM51 movement.
We hope you’re staying strong for Dry January, but if you need a little treat to help get you through the last half of the month look no further than OLIPOP. The brand just launched the Mocktails in Minutes Starter Kit ($36 for a 12-pack). If you need a little inspiration, head over to your own virtual mocktail generator and get ideas to create a fresh drink using one of the kit’s four flavors: Tropical Punch, Classic Grape, Orange Squeeze and Lemon Lime.
Gerber just released the Prybrid Utility Clip ($20), a hybrid tool that combines eight different tools in a compact multitool and a utility knife blade. It’s available in Burnt Orange, Urban Blue and OD Green, and is small and light enough to put on your keychain.
The big winners from this effort thus far, however, appears to be branding consultants. Nearly every manufacturer has created a novel, EV-specific sub-brand to mark their transition. Nearly all of these branding efforts have turned out awfully.
What happened? Essentially, car companies took the wrong lesson from Tesla’s success. They tried to position their EVs as cool, futuristic tech products instead of cars, with names and branding to match. The efforts have been ham-fisted — boring at best, confusing mouthfuls at worst. Worse, the nouveau branding is squandering what should have been conventional manufacturers’ biggest advantage against upstarts like Tesla: their reputations and heritage.
Volkswagen
Modern EV branding could not sound more ubiquitous
Manufacturers intended their EV brands to sound distinctive. Instead, most blend in with each other like achromatic crossovers in a parking garage.
BMW tried to sound tech-forward, hopping on the use of the “i’ — like “information,” like a computer, get it? — prefix in the early 2010s with the i3 and the i8 hybrid. VW made a similar play with its ID. cars. Cadillac has taken on IQ, but to be different, uses it as a suffix awkwardly replacing the letters of actual words — Lyriq, Optiq, etc. Hyundai, oddly enough, also uses “IQ,” but it added a minimal amount of zest by using it in the form of the name Ioniq.
Brands that eschewed “i” went for “e.” (If we have to tell you what that’s supposed to imply, you may be beyond help.) Mercedes launched the EQ sub-brand, but also dabbled with calling those cars Mercedes-EQ. Volvo settled on EX. Audi affixes the name e-Tron to its EVs. Kia swiped up the on-the-nose name of EV before other manufacturers could get there.
Here’s the thing: all these brands sound basically identical; they add nothing of value to the car’s name or identity, and they don’t feel built for the long haul — especially come the day when manufacturers are only building EVs. Is Kia really expecting buyers to stop, drop and differentiate between the EV3, EV4, EV5, EV6, EV7, EV8 and EV9 when walking into a dealer?
Surely, the Japanese brands — relative late-comers to EVs — could have avoided this pitfall. Toyota bucked that trend a bit by using Beyond Zero (shortened to bZ for use on cars) branding. At least, it seemed like it bucked the trend … until chief rival Honda unveiled its new EV line, the nearly identically-named Zero series.
The badge on the bZ4x attempts to differentiate its constituent pieces through color. That doesn’t make it less confusing.Toyota
Wonky branding yields wonky and confusing car names
Speaking of Toyota: Toyota went all-in with its oddly stylized bZ branding. Instead of Highlander bZ or Tacoma bZ thus far, Toyota has launched the bZ4X, which sounds more like a printer that would have been destroyed in Office Space.
Audi, meanwhile, has just pulled itself out of a downright muddle with its again-unnecessarily-lowercase e-Tron branding. These days, Audi is simply added e-Tron to its regular alphanumeric nomenclature (i.e. Q4 E-Tron); still, not long ago, the brand’s two EV models were the E-Tron GT sports car and the E-Tron SUV … neither of which had any relation to one another beneath the skin.
Polestar adds a sticker to its EVs to tell people what kind of car it is. Tyler Duffy
We’ve even had an unnecessary new EV brand
Volvo has spent an inordinate amount of effort spinning its performance arm Polestar off into a separate brand, complete with its own showrooms. The cars are nice, and so is the new straight-forward pricing model. But it’s not clear why it needed to be a separate brand.
Polestar is positioned to be more premium and exciting than Volvo. But the only car currently in the new showrooms is the Polestar 2, which is competing with relatively affordable mass-market EVs … and looks very much like a Volvo sedan. And it’s impossible to explain what Polestar is without referencing Volvo.
How well is Polestar resonating with buyers? Here’s a clue: the Polestar logo usually goes unseen in body color on its vehicles. Polestar actually affixes stickers on the doors of its press cars so onlookers can tell what the car is.
Yes, Polestar does have several exciting new cars en route. But you could also argue those models just siphoning excitement away from Volvo’s EV transition.
“Lightning” would be a perfect name for an electric F-150 even if it weren’t the name of Ford’s old super-truck.Courtesy Ford
The best EV branding has leaned on tradition
If you were to pick out a brand that has done EV branding relatively well, it’s Ford. Instead of trying to give its electric vehicles completely new brand identities, Ford has tied EVs to its existing branding to add authenticity.
Naming its first EV crossover the Mustang Mach-E may have seemed like sacrilege on paper. But in practice, is resonated with buyers, injected some style and uniqueness into the electric car market — and probably forced Ford to put a bit more effort into it on the performance front. How did Ford make its first electric truck feel less scary? By calling it a Ford F-150 Lightning, harkening back to the old performance truck version of the F-Series — and making it look as much like a combustion F-150 as possible.
The VW ID. GTI’s name makes it a bit more clear what to expect when you meet it.Volkswagen
Car companies, thankfully, are starting to rethink EV branding
The tides appear to be turning in a favorable way, however. Last year, VW released an ID concept that was an electric take on the GTI and simply named it the ID. GTI. We expect that car will make it to production. Mercedes is reportedly phasing out its EQ branding for vehicles starting this year, preparing for the day when the EQS is just the S-Class.
Chevy’s new Blazer EV uses the same name and cribs a lot of its looks from its successful Blazer combustion counterpart (and will soon have a Blazer SS EV model). The brand is using the same method with the upcoming Equinox EV. And we should see the Corvette brand make it to the EV world soon. Here’s hoping that if Toyota drops a production version of its cool unibody EV pickup, it chooses the name Stout over something like … bZ3T.
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Still think your workstation is fine without a desktop or monitor stand? Think again. A good monitor stand elevates your screen, which helps with posture and overall productivity; it improves air circulation so your computer doesn’t overheat; and it can add storage to your desk, organizing your pens, notebooks, paperclips and EDC — or just hide them altogether.
Given that many of us have been working from home for a good while (and will likely continue to do so for the foreseeable future), it’s important to make sure your home office looks nice — and a desktop stand can definitely help with that, too.
Grovemade’s entire Desk Collection is pricey but stunning. This particular offering stands out for its simplicity and elegant design. The wood is the star of the show, and it comes in either walnut or maple.
The Desk Shelf is also part of Grovemade’s Desk Collection. It’s made mostly of wood, in your choice of nine different finishes, and underneath it has an aluminum shelf for storing and hiding your various peripherals (including a laptop) when not in use.
It comes in four different widths: small (shown), medium, large and XL, with the latter two designed to hold two monitors (or one monitor and a pair of computer speakers).
Twelve South’s Curve Riser is a unique, minimalist monitor stand. It has an all metal design with a built-in storage shelf. And it lifts your monitor 4.25 inches off the desk, higher than many other options.
Satechi’s monitor stand addresses a problem most stands don’t: hard-to-reach ports. The “stand hub” has a number of outward-facing ports — USB-C port (up to 5 Gbps), three USB 3.0 ports (up to 5 Gbps), slots for both micro and SD cards (up to 104 Mbps) and a headphone jack — so you don’t have to worry about blindly feeling behind your monitor or desktop for the correct port. It’s available in silver or space gray.
A surprising amount of storage for desktop peripherals
Available in several different finishes
Cons
Not the biggest monitor stand
Doesn't lift monitor that high off desk
Design won't match everyone's aesthetic
Simple Houseware’s monitor stand is a great option for anybody shopping on a budget. It isn’t flashy, but it’s sturdy thanks to its metal design. It elevates your stand a whopping six inches off the desk, and it has a number of handy organizational slots.
This monitor stand is a charmer. It’s made almost entirely out of bamboo, and it has three storage compartments complete with a pull-out drawer. It also elevates your monitor nearly five inches off your desk, and you can slide a mouse or keyboard underneath the bottom for further storage.
Twelve South only makes accessories for Apple products. The HiRise Pro, for example, is specifically designed to house iMacs and iMac Pros. It sheaths the base, while also providing additional storage. On top of the HiRise Pro is a leather pad, where you can safely and easily rest your EDC, like your AirPods or a keychain. The front grille, which grips the base via magnets, is reversible, so you can switch between gunmetal and walnut.
Monoprice’s budget-friendly desktop stand is more of a shelf, really. It’s 22 inches across, plenty big enough to hold a desktop or monitor. And its platform rises a few inches off the desk so you can store things under it and declutter your space. It’s available in black or translucent.
Huanuo’s monitor stand is all about organization. It has a rather large pull-out drawer as well as two side compartments, which are ideal for holding pens, notepads and various office supplies. It also raises your monitor several inches off the desk to a more ergonomic working height.
Artifox makes a wide range of modern stands, all simple and elegant, wonderfully blending wood and metal. Its Large Stand acts as both a monitor stand and desktop shelf, allowing you to store accessories underneath). It comes in three different styles: walnut (shown), white oak and black oak.
If you’re looking for a more adjustable solution that frees up even more desk space, get a monitor arm. The Jarvis Monitor Arm, one of our favorites, easily grips to your desk and elevates your monitor to your natural line of sight. (It comes with a removable VESA plate that works with a wide variety monitors.)
Editor’s note: As of April 30, 2023, Fully no longer exists as a standalone brand. However, some of its products will continue to be produced and sold through Herman Miller and DWR stores.
Just in Time for Cold Temps: An Infrared Sauna Blanket
Score all the benefits of an infrared sauna from the comfort of home.
MiHIGH
Presented ByMiHigh
Published
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Home saunas have skyrocketed in popularity over the past few years, but not everyone can afford to install or make room for a large in-home unit.
Introducing the perfect solution: the Infrared Sauna Blanket V2 ($599) from MiHigh. Slip into the lightweight bag and let the stresses of the world melt away. While it might feel like you’re just laying there, the benefits of the infrared sauna are stacking up. From detoxification, stress reduction, clearer skin and better sleep, infrared heat has been proven to help your health and well-being.
You’ll burn 300 to 600 calories persession, and help your body and muscles recover at the same time. Other benefits include an overall sense of calm that lasts well after your session ends. Right now, you can get $100 off the sauna blanket.
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The year 2020 saw a lot of new hobbies embraced. Sourdough starters were all over TikTok and Instagram. Women were cutting their own bangs in droves. Sewing, baking, crafting and crocheting were everywhere.
Coal Headwear
If you kept up your hobby and turned it into a bona fide passion, you’re not alone. Pro snowboarder Naima Antolin is one who stuck with her craft, crochet — and recently launched her own beanie collaboration with one of our favorite snow sports accessory brands, Coal Headwear.
Let’s start from the top — how did you get into crocheting? What led you down this path?
I learned how to knit first in high school, knitted maybe a few months and then 10, 15 years down the line Covid happened. I had stopped knitting throughout that time, and I just wanted something to do, like most people. I decided to pick knitting back up and my sister knew how to crochet and I was always interested in crocheting. I thought, ‘You know what? I’m gonna try this out.’ And so I taught myself how to crochet and then I just never stopped.
What were the first things you made? Was it straight into beanies or were you doing other stuff?
Beanies and hats were always the easiest, especially ’cause I like to travel and pop around for snowboarding. Having a smaller project was always easier to travel with as opposed to making a sweater — which I’ll still do, but you end up carrying a lot more yarn in your bags than with a hat.
“Taking up crocheting was born from a need for craft and community.”
I didn’t know anybody personally in my circle that crocheted or knitted. I was yearning for that community to nerd out on. Around 2020 was when I first heard of TikTok and someone was like, ‘Well, you should maybe look into making a TikTok account for your crafting. You might find something there.’ This was still like during a time when a lot of lockdowns were happening. I started just posting crafting stuff on TikTok and then I found a whole crafting community on that platform and that helped push my creativity and yearning to want to learn more about the craft.
How did the Coal Headwear collaboration come to be?
It started about a year before this current hat concept came to be. I had been testing patterns with my followers on TikTok, and my first pattern ended up being the beanie that my partner wore in the Paper Tiger project. That was maybe the first spark of collabing with Coal with my crocheting.
Coal Headwear
We did a small batch where I crocheted like 20 hats and then we used those as giveaways for promos for that project. And then I had what I thought was one of those ‘crazy ideas’ — I was talking to a friend and had an idea to pitch Coal on a crocheted hat concept where I can design it, but then they mass-produce it to get it in more people’s hands.
And I thought if people want to or know how to crochet or wanna learn how to crochet, we should attach the pattern to it. My friend encouraged me to approach Coal. I thought it would be like three years out, but after I put the idea out to Coal, they immediately got back to me saying, “Yes, let’s do this.” What I originally thought was this three-year plan to start the project turned into within two years it’s now out in the world.
What is the difference between the handmade beanies versus factory produced?
They’re honestly really similar. Other than maybe the yarn, because when you handmake it, you might not be able to find the exact yarn that the factory’s using. I made a handmade beanie and they sent it over to the factory so they could try to get it as close as they could. The different materials will make it slightly different but overall, I would say it’s very similar.
Do you think there’s a correlation between extreme sports and crafting?
I feel like sports or maybe anything in life and crafting, whether it’s art or, you know, knitting, sewing, that it helps ground people. Especially when they do extreme sports. It’s a really nice balance.
What’s the most unique thing you’ve crocheted?
One of my favorite hats I’ve made is this hat I wore when I did an interview on The Bomb Hole — I call it the ‘Who Are You’ hat because there’s six little square panels that have different faces, like smiley faces or frownie faces. I really like that concept of being able to choose which particular face is facing forward for the day.
The Bomb Hole
What are your takeaways from this experience?
I can’t get over the fact that it all started as a crazy idea. Something I’ve personally been trying to be better at is to take those risks, to try, and every time I’ve done that in the past two years, I keep being surprised with how many ‘yeses’ I’ve been getting. Every experience, it’s another reminder to just try. I’m here to try and this is the outcome of that. So I’m just thankful for working with Coal and everybody else that’s believed in these ideas.
Car media caters to car enthusiasts, but most people who arrive in showrooms are normal people. They aren’t heading out to track days or accessorizing their off-roaders. They just want a practical car that meets their needs.
The Honda CR-V has long excelled at being just that. Add in the model’s affordability and quality, and you have a formula that has made this compact crossover one of America’s perennial best-selling cars.
The sixth-generation CR-V is all-new for 2023. Its changes track neatly with what Honda did with the Accord. The CR-V gets a statelier and more rugged-looking exterior (albeit not quite an expressionless-face-emoji front end like the Accord). It gets the upgraded interior from the new Civic. And as with the Accord, the CR-V Hybrid is no longer just the efficiency model; it’s the premium one, too, with 204 horsepower and 247 lb-ft of torque.
Honda lent me the top-tier CR-V Touring Hybrid model for about 10 days. And I sampled the SUV in its natural environment: schlepping my family around suburbia over the long Thanksgiving weekend.
The 2023 Honda CR-V Hybrid: What We Think
Tyler Duffy
You can’t really make owning a Honda CR-V Hybrid feel thrilling or sexy — despite Honda’s best efforts. But few, if any cars are as brilliant at being boring. The CR-V is expertly tuned for everyday driving. It’s pleasant to live with and spacious. I defy someone to find a better fully-loaded family SUV package for $40,000.
My only real knock would be with the efficiency. It’s a steep price ($4,200 minimum) to upgrade to a hybrid from the standard CR-V. It’s not as efficient in city driving as competitors, and I did not even come close to the EPA estimates in real driving.
To learn more about our testing methodology and how we evaluate products, head here.
The CR-V turns being boring into an art form
Tyler Duffy
Honda knows how to tune cars. And the same expertise that preps the Civic Type R for track day sets up the CR-V for the performance it needs on the Trader Joe’s run.
The CR-V Hybrid can’t hang with the Accord on sporty driving dynamics; it’s higher-riding and about 700 pounds heavier. But while not being quick or sporty, the CR-V is distinctively well-balanced. It controls itself in corners without feeling super stiff over bumps. The steering is relaxingly light without being sloppy. And provided you don’t do anything extreme or hooligan-ish, the hybrid powertrain feels as refined and quiet as a hybrid with a CVT can get.
Inside, the CR-V is a Civic with a ton of space
Tyler Duffy
Like every new Honda, the CR-V gets its version of the Civic’s interior. It’s clean, intuitive and more modern-looking than the previous-gen. The leather-trimmed seats on the Sport Touring AWD trim feel like decent quality for the price point. And to deploy the technical term, you get a crap-ton of space.
The CR-V Hybrid has a cavernous 36.3 cubic feet of cargo area behind the second row and up to 76.5 cubic feet with the seats folded. Wide door openings ease entry and exits for adults, children and car seats. It just makes dealing with everyday life easy.
I had a hard time hitting the CR-V’s EPA gas mileage
Tyler Duffy
The EPA rates the Civic Hybrid AWD for 34 mpg city and 40 mpg highway (37 mpg combined). I came nowhere near that, averaging about 28 mpg over 180-ish miles — and that was before I left the car idling to take pictures.
I didn’t drive like a loon to reach that level of inefficiency. My city/highway mix was more like 80/20 than the EPA’s 55/45 testing. It was also quite cold in Michigan that week; temperatures averaged in the 20s and dipped below at night. That, plus the staccato rhythms of school pickups and family dinner trips, may have played a role.
The CR-V’s power liftgate height is adjustable. When I got the car it was perfectly adjusted to “hit Tyler in the face as he bends down” height. I figured out how to adjust that.
I never quite got around to addressing my issue with the front seats, which automatically back up to let you out (but don’t return to where they were). I felt like I needed to adjust the driver’s seat every time I entered the car.
2023 Honda CR-V Hybrid: Alternatives
Tyler Duffy
Compact crossovers are America’s most popular non-trucks. So, almost every manufacturer has a competitor in this segment. Looking at hybrids, the CR-V’s main rival is the Toyota RAV4 Hybrid. Other options include the Hyundai Tucson Hybrid (one of our faves), the Kia Sportage Hybrid and the Ford Escape Hybrid.
Unless you’re looking for Subaru off-road capability, it’s hard to find an area where the CR-V would come up lacking against its competition. The Tucson Hybrid might be a bit more fun to drive.
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If you haven’t noticed, top-of-the-line noise-canceling headphones have gotten more expensive in recent years. The latest flagship models by Bose, Sony and Bowers & Wilkins all cost in the region of $400, for example. Apple’s AirPods Max are priced at $549 (although they are frequently on sale these days). And you even spend a lot more — like, over $1,000 — on a so-called “luxury” pair.
The good news is that for more frugal-minded individuals, there are mid-range and budget-friendly options that are quite good. They sacrifice things like premium materials and some high-end features to keep the price down, and while they’re active noise-cancellation capabilities and overall sound quality aren’t as good, either, they’re not that much worse.
Prime example: Anker’s newest noise-canceling headphones, the Soundcore Space Ones, which cost less than $100.
The Anker Soundcore Space One in black. They’re also available in gold or blue finishes.Tucker Bowe
For the price, these headphones overdeliver. They may not offer the elite sound quality and noise-canceling abilities of top models by Bose, Sony or Apple, but they still do a decent job of both. Throw in the fact that they’re quite comfortable and travel-friendly, are loaded with premium features (like customizable EQ, Bluetooth multi-point and LDAC support) and have exceptionally long battery life, and the Soundcore Space Ones are just excellent value.
Quite simply, they’re the best noise-canceling headphones I’ve tested that cost less than $100.
To learn more about our testing methodology and how we evaluate products, head here.
Sound quality and ANC aren't at same level as more expensive options
Mostly plastic design is a tradeoff
The sound is decent, albeit a little bass heavy
The audio is bass heavy by default, but you can tweak the EQ or have the headphones adjust it for you based on your hearing abilities. Tucker Bowe
I’m not going to tell you that the Soundcore Space One sound as good as my Sony WH-1000XM5 or AirPods Max — they definitely don’t. The headphones have 40mm dynamic drivers that, by default, deliver vibrant (albeit bass-heavy) sound with a pretty wide soundstage. I’ve been listening to a lot of upbeat tracks with a good amount of bass by Blink-182 (such as “Blink Wave“) and Lorde (such as “Team“) recently, and I think that’s where these headphones sound best.
If that kind of music isn’t really your jam, the neat thing about the Soundcore Space Ones is that they give you a lot of options to customize the sound. Through the Soundcore app, you can move eight different EQ sliders depending on your preference. You can even take an in-app hearing test — called HearID — where the headphones will create a custom sound profile for yourself based on your hearing and sound preferences. It’s pretty neat.
The headphones also support LDAC for higher-resolution audio listening … if you have an Android smartphone. It’s a nice premium feature, but I wasn’t able to try it out as I did most of my testing on an iPhone. (Also, if you’re really concerned about taking advantage of LDAC files, I can’t imagine you’d be thinking about buying these budget-friendly headphones.)
The noise-cancellation is very effective, but not elite
You can toggle between five different strengths of ANC and Transparency settings. Tucker Bowe
With active noise-cancellation turned on, the Soundcore Space Ones do an effective job at blocking out most sounds — particularly voices (aka the midrange) — that I heard while running errands and going grocery shopping. They did a good job at dampening my brother’s Fortnite tantrums, too. It’s not absolutely quiet when ANC is turned on as some sounds (mostly higher-end frequencies) slipped in, but even the best ANC headphones have trouble with that.
When it comes to the transparency mode, I was less impressed. It filters outside sounds in so that you can better hear your surroundings or have quick convos without pausing your music, but it doesn’t sound great. It sounds a bit synthetic and processed, where the best ANC headphones (like the AirPods Max) have transparency modes that make it sound as if you’re not wearing headphones at all. The Soundcore Space One are definitely not that.
It’s worth mentioning that you can adjust the levels of active noise-cancellation and transparency modes via the app. The strength of each is on a scale from one to five and by default each is set to the max strength (five). Naturally, I kept both at five (the max) for the majority of my testing because I’m an all-in kind of guy.
They’re lightweight, comfortable and travel-friendly
The Anker Soundcore Space One can fold flat or in a more traditional compact design.Tucker Bowe
The Soundcore Space Ones are made of mostly plastic, but that doesn’t mean that they feel super cheap — after all, a lot of flagship noise-canceling headphones, like the Sony WH-1000XM5 and the Beats Studio Pro, are also made of mostly plastic. This helps the headphones stay fairly lightweight and comfortable, which are two boxes that the Soundcore Space Ones definitely check.
The earcups are quite big, which I also like as they fit well over my ears instead of resting a little bit on them which can be annoying. The headphones can fold flat, so you can place them down on your desk, or they can fold compact in a more traditional travel-friendly design. It’s actually quite rare for wireless headphones to do both.
They don’t skimp out on battery life
You can see the wear detection sensor that’s located in the left earcup.Tucker Bowe
The battery life is one thing that is definitely on par with more expensive noise-canceling headphones. They’re rated to have up to 40 hours of battery life with ANC turned on; turn it off and you get an extra 15 hours (that’s a total of 55 hours) of listening time. I’ve been listening to these headphones for the past month and I can count on one hand how many times I’ve had to charge them — it’s awesome.
When you charge them, they also charge fast. A quick five-minute charge (via USB-C) gives you roughly four hours of juice. It’s nice.
There are a lot of little things to like about these headphones
I’m a big fan of the physical buttons on the Space One.Tucker Bowe
The Soundcore Space Ones have a number of other details and features that make them feel like more premium noise-canceling headphones. They support Bluetooth multi-point so you can have them connected to your laptop and smartphone at the same time. I love their physical buttons — instead of swipe controls — for adjusting volume, toggling between ANC and transparency modes and, yes, there’s an actual power button for turning the headphones on/off (take note, Apple).
There’s a wear detection sensor in the left earcup so that your music automatically plays/pauses when you put the headphones on and take them off — just like AirPods. This means if somebody talks to you, you can quickly lift up the left earcup to pause your music without having to take off the headphones completely. (Note: wear detection is turned off by default, but it can be turned on in the app.)
There’s also an “Easy Chat” feature you can enable where, when you cover the left earcup with your hand, your music pauses and headphones go into transparency mode so you can better have a conversation. Sony has a similar feature with its wireless headphones, but I prefer to have it turned off so I can touch my headphones more freely.
Anker Soundcore Space One: Alternatives
The Anker Soundcore Space Ones and the Sony WH-1000XM5s are made of similar materials and feel alike, but the Sonys are roughly four times the price. Tucker Bowe
If you’re looking in the $100 price range, there actually aren’t that many good options for noise-canceling headphones made by trustworthy brands. Anker has made a few models in recent years and the Soundcore Space Ones are basically new-and-improved versions of its Soundcore Life Q30s ($80), which you can still buy. The Edifier W820NBs ($80) are good affordable options that we’ve tested in the past as well.
Every month, we’re tasting a huge amount of beer, whiskey and other beverages — both alcoholic and non-alcoholic. In some cases, we’re taste-testing the industry’s best new products, and in others, we’re coming across hidden gems in the wild. Our favorites from the last four weeks are gathered here, in the best things we drank this month.
To learn more about our testing methodology and how we evaluate products, head here.
Optimist Botanicals Cali Spritz
John Zientek
Los Angeles-based Optimist Botanicals makes a non-alcoholic bitter amaro with a nod to the West Coast thanks to botanicals like pink grapefruit, mandarin orange, bay laurel, sage, gentian and dandelion root, among others. The brand also offers a bitter-sweet amaro spritz — a citrus, herbal blend bolstered with adaptogenic plants.
This 20-calorie sipper is light and refreshing and helps relieve stress with the addition of ashwagandha and schisandra. It’s not quite as sweet as crowd-favorite non-alcoholic apéritif Ghia, and unlike Ghia, it does have caffeine due to the inclusion of black tea and yerba mate. If you’re looking for a complex, bitter spritz that’s alcohol-free, this is definitely worth seeking out. — John Zientek, Managing Editor
As a lover of white Russians (thanks largely to my youthful exposure to The Big Lebowski), I jumped at the chance to try 10 Barrel’s canned cocktail version — which is actually made with coffee, rum, vodka and — most interestingly — oat milk instead of cream (making it suitable for the lactose intolerant, vegans, etc.).
With its 13.9 percent ABV, this canned cocktail is a heavy hitter. But that’s not what took me by surprise most. Rather, the fact that it’s carbonated — more like a nitro beer than, say, a soda — is what stood out to me most. It’s also quite thick, which is especially odd when paired with those nitro bubbles. While I enjoyed trying it, it’s definitely more suitable as a once-in-a-while treat than a regular sipper. — Sean Tirman, Associate Editor
I respect Dry January and any opportunity to reassess any behavior in your life. That said, I do think moderation is an approach to take for 12 months out of the year, so I typically keep some of the better NA beers stocked to mix in the rotation year-round. And Brooklyn Brewery’s Special Effects are some of the better ones.
The esteemed brewery recently released a variety pack of its Special Effects NA beers, including a new beer in itself (Grapefruit IPA). The others included are Pils, IPA and Hoppy Amber. Each of these beers is a true version of its respective style and could easily pass for an alcoholic beer. The new Grapefruit IPA has a bit of that OG American IPA hop flavor to it, with a grapefruit hit on the front and a tiny bit of a tart finish. It’s a worthy addition to the Special Effects family and rounds out a pretty solid NA variety pack that I’ll be keeping stocked the other 11 months of the year as well. — Ryan Brower, Managing Editor
Everything Buffalo Trace Distillery releases these days is a home run, it seems. And when you add a celebrity who’s popular across a mind-bogglingly wide range of demographics in Chris Stapleton to the mix? Now you’re really cooking with gas. Traveller Whiskey, released at the start of 2024, is a long-gestating collab between the award-winning distillery and the Grammy winner. It’s a blended whiskey, the best one tasted by Stapleton and Buffalo Trace master distiller Harlen Wheatley out of over 50 they tried.
Despite Buffalo Trace‘s reputation, I admit I was a little skeptical of the whiskey. Celebrity collabs are hit or miss, the price point was affordable ($40) and the label gives no indication of what’s actually in the bottle. But all those worries fell by the wayside once I took a sip — this is a good whiskey. It’s certainly bourbon-heavy on the nose and palate, with vanilla, caramel corn and toffee being the most prevalent flavors. There’s also definitely some rye spice on the backend, and I think I detect a bit of creamy wheat — maybe they threw some Weller in there, who knows? I don’t, but I do know that I like this whiskey. — Johnny Brayson, Associate Editor
Let’s jump right into it: the Subaru WRX TR represents the purest focus on the driving experience out of any model in the line. It’s the natural choice for the enthusiast. The TR stands for “Tuner Ready,” reflecting the fact that it’s the stripped-down version of the standard Subaru WRX that acts as a blank canvas for tuners to carry out their creative vision with brush strokes of burbly 3-inch turbo-back exhausts, and a dab of HKS SSQV blow-off valve.
Oh, whoops, I forgot to mention: I’m talking about the 2006 version of the WRX TR, not the new-for-2024 version. Subaru revived the TR moniker for the latest addition to the Rex lineup, but not necessarily the ethos of the original TR. The 2024 version of the WRX TR takes the top spot in the WRX hierarchy, bringing together the creature comforts of the WRX GT with the added performance benefits of new Brembo brakes and a stiffer suspension — and of course, a six-speed manual. No CVT on offer here.
So if you missed the WRX TR the first time around in ‘06, is this your second chance at a “pure” WRX driving experience? Well, sort of.
The tuner scene certainly ain’t what it used to be — you’ll note those Fast and Furious movies have changed quite a bit since then — and brand-new cars aren’t the same, either. What the TR does best is almost exactly the opposite of what the original ‘06 model did: where that one was stripped down and ready to tune, the new one is factory-loaded with the sort of mods that we would have wanted to do … albeit with a restraint that may not have been exercised back in the tuner glory days.
You’ll pay for the privilege, too: the 2024 WRX TR rings in at $42,775. Like we said, this isn’t 2006.
Subaru
The 2024 WRX TR: What We Think
The best way to approach the new WRX TR is to forget about the TR of 2006 — and to forget about the ERX STI, which used to sit at the top of the lineup in previous generations, while you’re at it. They’re gone, and there’s nothing we can do about it.
Instead, appreciate the ’24 TR on its own terms. It’s a blast to drive, it’s practical — and perhaps most surprising of all, it’s subtle. But there are signs that it’s not a “normal” WRX. The first is the bright red Brembo calipers peeping through the model-specific 19” anthracite wheels wrapped in Bridgestone Potenza S007 tires. Inside, you’ll see Recaro stitched into the sport seats with microfiber inserts. What you won’t see — but rather feel — is the worked-over suspension setup with stiffer spring rates and tuned damping.
The aforementioned Recaros.Subaru
Less is more when it comes to the WRX TR
You’re not getting a big wing, you’re not getting a throaty exhaust, you’re not even getting Subaru’s signature gold wheels: isn’t this supposed to be the track-ready model?
But hold on a second. Making something simple is often more difficult than making it over the top. This isn’t a sleeper by any means; it still has the exact same 2.4-liter turbocharged flat-four rated at 271 horsepower and 258 pound-feet of torque. It doesn’t even benefit from cranked-up boost; it’s still running at a conservative 12 psi. What you get, then, is an “IYKYK” WRX.
Subtlty is an art, and it would have been very easy for Subaru to slap some pink badging on and capitalize on the STI name, which is exactly what it did with the new BRZ tS. Instead, the WRX Tr is an exercise in subtlety, especially in dark blue paint. It’s almost as if Subaru has grown up alongside the teenagers who lusted after the TR in 2006 and designed a WRX for who they might be close to 20 years later.
Subaru stuck to the formula we know and love
To get to know the WRX TR, Subaru brought me to Italy, where I was able to rip through the course of the famed Targa Florio — Siciliy’s daring road race that claimed the lives of nine drivers from 1906 to 1977. I drove on a rainy day, and that meant slick roads, the kind that made the WRX absolutely shine. Truthfully speaking, there isn’t a car I’d rather be driving in a setting like that.
Enthusiasts might bemoan the dumbing-down of the latest WRX’s rally-ready character, but truth be told, it’s not that different than it ever was. You have a turbocharged flat-four up front, symmetrical all-wheel-drive underneath you and a stick shift at your command. How can that not be fun?
Yes, you still get a giant touchscreen infotainment.Subaru
By the end of the drive, my fluency in sliding sideways was thoroughly proven — and it wasn’t even at all that nerve-wracking, just a little controlled fishtailing engineered to the driving dynamics. Grip is a spectrum, and the WRX TR never strayed too far from the grabby side of it … except when I wanted it to.
It’s worth applauding Subaru’s decision to keep the manual transmission and a performance-oriented internal combustion engine around. There’s talk of the STI’s eventual return in hybrid or even electric form eventually; that means the 2024 WRX TR might be the last chance to capitalize on a formula that can only be described as the stuff of legend.
You can’t outdrive the WRX TR
The brutally honest reality is that unless you’re Petter Solberg or Brandon Semenuk, it’s unlikely that you can outdrive the TR.
There’s a narrative out there about the WRX becoming soft. I’m not sure that’s true. The 5-percent-stiffer springs and the six-piston Brembo brake calipers with 13.4-inch rotors of the TR are plenty capable, and the whole package is actually engineered for track use. (For the record, that’s what Subaru is saying TR now stands for: Track Ready.)
The setup is so capable in the areas where we know the WRX shines: snow, sleet, rain, gravel and of course dry pavement. It has the same sort of confidence-inspiring nature that it’s always had behind the wheel, but what it lacks is the cultural prowess of something with cherry red accents.
The biggest problem with the TR is that Subaru made a WRX that performs well in all categories, but doesn’t broadcast that message the same way past performance models did. But here’s the thing: that’s a strength, not a weakness.
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The 1950s was a time of tremendous change, and not just because of the advent of rock and roll and the spread of television. The Allied victory in World War II had transformed the United States into an economic behemoth and a global superpower, and US-funded reconstruction efforts led to a speedy and prosperous recovery in Western Europe, as well. This influx of cash in the hands of veterans looking for new adventures and hobbies, along with massive strides in technology made during the war effort, led to explosions in global exploration and new sporting activities.
Everywhere you looked, it seemed risk-takers were diving to the depths of the oceans, summiting the world’s tallest mountains, hitting the racetrack at new speeds, venturing over the poles and taking to the skies with an eye toward space. Those partaking in these new adventures required purpose-built tools that could accompany them and stand up to whatever mystery lay around the next horizon, and the watch industry of the 1950s was more than ready to heed the call.
The decade saw the invention of a number of now-standard watch styles that simply didn’t exist prior to the 1950s because there was no need for them. But necessity is the mother of invention, so when divers, pilots and climbers came calling, watch brands were ready with dedicated dive watches, GMT watches, flight computers, explorer’s watches and more.
Sports watches and tool watches began to supplant dress watches on shoppers’ wish lists in the ’50s, and a number of the most iconic watches in history first appeared on wrists during this mid-century window. We’ve selected the 15 watches from the 1950s that made the biggest impact on the industry, so take a look below, Daddy-O.
Why It’s Significant: An accurate and beautiful dress watch, the “Connie” was Omega’s first flagship and was the de facto “nice watch” of Post-War professionals.
Sports watches and tool watches weren’t on the wrists of most men prior to the 1950s. If you wore a watch, it was a dress watch. And in the early 1950s, there was arguably no greater dress watch than the Omega Constellation, which during the decade became a symbol of the Swiss watch industry. Not only was the Constellation futuristic and stylish, with the most desirable references featuring faceted “pie pan” dials and angled “dog leg” lugs, but it was also an extremely precise chronometer.
The watch’s name was derived from the medallion on its caseback depicting eight stars above the Cupola of the Geneva Observatory, representing Omega’s success over the prior two decades at Kew-Tedding and Geneva Observatory competitions, where it broke two chronometer records for accuracy and won six first-place awards.
The watch gave Omega a head start as the brand looked to continue its status as the Swiss watch industry’s top dog for another decade, and even though Rolex increased the pressure considerably in the decade, the prestigious Connie would continue to lead Omega’s successful run through the next decade.
Why It’s Significant: Became a symbol of endurance — and of Rolex’s marketing savvy — when an earlier prototype accompanied the first summiters of Mount Everest.
You probably recognize the Rolex Explorer today as the watch that climbed Mount Everest … but it wasn’t. You can chalk that myth up to Rolex and its unmatched marketing. By the 1950s, people were used to the bold strategy Rolex used to sell its watches, from displaying waterproof watches submerged in fishtanks in store windows to strapping a Rolex Oyster to the wrist of swimmer Mercedes Gleitze for her journey across the English Channel in 1927. But the Explorer took things up a notch because of the way it stretched the truth.
Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first humans to ever reach the summit of Mount Everest in 1953. Rolex equipped the pair with prototype Rolex Oyster watches on the expedition — but the evidence is murky that either actually wore a Rolex on the summit, and Hillary claimed to have worn a Smiths watch to the mountaintop.
But Rolex released the Explorer to commemorate the expedition, and heavy marketing cemented the watch as “the Everest watch” in the public consciousness. The rugged and simple tool watch became an instant hit and created the template for modern explorer’s watches. Even 70 years later, it remains largely unchanged.
Why It’s Significant: Considered the first modern dive watch, combining a rotating locking bezel, high water resistance, a double-sealed crown and high luminosity.
Three dive watches splashed onto the scene in 1953, but it’s generally accepted that Blancpain’s Fifty Fathoms was the first to do so (and it’s the only brand among the three to make that claim). Blancpain was a small and mostly unknown Swiss brand when it was approached by the French Navy in 1952 to make a professional dive watch for its new scuba combat unit. The brand rose to the challenge, creating an entirely new type of dive watch built to military specifications and establishing the template that we still recognize as a dive watch today.
Despite this accomplishment, Blancpain has remained relatively unknown as a brand, with most people still being unfamiliar with its history (it’s the oldest watch brand still in existence, dating back to 1735) up until it collaborated with Swatch on a Bioceramic version of the Fifty Fathoms in 2023 to mark the watch’s 70th anniversary.
But Blancpain deserves a lot of credit for doing something first, even if other brands were simultaneously and independently working on similar watches, and it remains one of the most important watches in history.
Why It’s Significant: While it may have been created a few months or so after the Blancpain, Rolex’s first professional diver remains the most influential and copied watch to this day.
If you’re told to picture a watch in your mind’s eye, the Submariner is likely the first one to come to mind. The quintessential sports watch, the go-to luxury watch, the definitive dive watch — however you want to describe it, no watch of the 20th century has had a larger impact than the Sub.
Its universally beloved good looks, true dive watch functionality (it was developed concurrently with, and debuted shortly after, the Fifty Fathoms) and legendary robustness — it launched as the first dive watch to claim 100m water resistance — have all contributed to the Submariner being the most mimicked watch on the market even seven decades after it first appeared.
The Sub was favored by true men of action, but celebrities like Steve McQueen and Sean Connery helped further an equally adventurous and glamorous reputation by wearing the watch on screen in the early 1960s — the latter, of course, having an outsized impact by doing so as James Bond.
And while the sheen eventually wore off the Constellation and dress watches in general, the Rolex Submariner, even today, remains the “nice watch” du jour, the timepiece a person buys once they’ve “made it.” And that doesn’t seem likely to change for at least another 70 years.
Why It’s Significant: The third modern dive watch to independently debut in ’53, the Sea Wolf was important for coming in at a much more accessible price point than its competitors.
Rounding out our trio of 1953’s innovative dive watches is the Zodiac Sea Wolf, admittedly the least impactful of all of them but still important for what it represented then and continues to represent today. Like the Fifty Fathoms and Submariner released the same year, the Sea Wolf was part of a new breed of purpose-built dive watch with a rotating timing bezel and a depth rating of around 100m.
But unlike those watches, it was made with the budget-conscious consumer in mind, with mid-century advertisements for the brand touting its comparative value in the Swiss watch industry. That value proposition, along with Zodiac’s marketing of the watch for use in “tropical countries,” led to explosive popularity among U.S. soldiers serving in the Vietnam War in the 1960s and ’70s.
Although the Sea Wolf’s contributions to history were largely forgotten in the ensuing decades as the brand fell on hard times — its unwanted association with the Zodiac Killer, who signed his letters with the brand’s logo and may have worn a Sea Wolf, didn’t help matters — the watch has received heightened attention this century thanks to Zodiac’s overall resurgence and its successful relaunch of the Sea Wolf line.
The idea of an affordable tool watch that’s just as capable as those produced by luxury brands remains a strong draw in the watch market of today, and the Sea Wolf of the 1950s was a pioneer in that regard.
Why It’s Significant: The first modern tool watch to simultaneously track two timezones, thanks to a rotating 24-hour bezel paired with a 24-hour dial.
World War II saw a massive uptick in innovation that soon trickled down to peacetime industry and consumer goods, with one of the most significant being the advent of the jet engine in 1939. By the 1950s, transatlantic jet passenger air travel was a reality, and pilots were desperate for watches that could simultaneously and easily track two time zones on a single dial.
Glycine was the first to answer the call, debuting the Airman in 1953. The watch featured a 24-hour dial and was the first to feature a 24-hour bezel that could be rotated, allowing the wearer to read two different times in 24-hour format at once.
Glycine was (and still is) a smaller Swiss brand, and the Airman never became a mainstream watch. But for those who relied on watches as tools, such as pilots, military men and even astronauts (NASA’s Pete Conrad wore an Airman to space on the Gemini 5 mission in 1965), the Airman was certainly on their radar.
Glycine still makes very faithful recreations of the original Airman today, and although its 24-on-24-hour format never really caught on, its iconic 24-hour steel bezel aesthetic has since been used by everyone from Seiko to Rolex.
Why It’s Significant: The first-ever GMT watch, released a year after the Glycine Airman but became far more influential with its use of a fourth hand to track time on a 24-hour bezel.
Rolex in the 1950s was a lot like Apple in the 21st century. The brand usually wasn’t the first to market with new concepts, but its skillfulness as an innovator and mastery over marketing ensured that its watches would be the ones people remembered and lusted after.
It happened with the Explorer, it happened with the Submariner and it happened with this watch, the first-ever example of what we consider a GMT watch. Created in response to a call from Pan Am for a two-time zone watch for its pilots, the GMT-Master debuted after the Glycine Airman, but it had a far greater impact.
Instead of relying on a 24-hour dial to read the main time, the Rolex used a conventional (and easier to read for most people) 12-hour format. It also added a fourth hand that made one revolution every 24 hours, which, when paired with the rotating 24-hour bezel — executed in an eye-catching “Pepsi” color format of red and blue to distinguish daytime and nighttime hours — made it easier than ever to read two time zones at once.
The GMT-Master quickly became associated with Pan Am pilots and air travel in general, and its example of a two-time zone watch became the industry standard. Today, practically every major watch brand makes a GMT watch with a 24-hour bezel (quite a few of which are of the “Pepsi” variety) and a fourth GMT hand, and all of them can trace their lineage to the GMT-Master.
Why It’s Significant: The definitive modern pilot’s tool watch, recognizable for its busy layout and slide rule bezel that allows for numerous flight calculations.
With so many pilots suddenly flying all over the world in the 1950s, there arose a need for more dedicated tool watches to aid them in their aviation. In addition to the GMT, the other major pilot-specific watch genre that sprang up in the decade was the flight calculator. In 1952, Breitling was approached by the US Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association to come up with a new chronograph to aid its pilots on their journeys.
The brand came up with the Navitimer, which incorporated a logarithmic slide rule into the bezel. By transferring this flight computer to the wrist in conjunction with the chronograph, the watch could be used to calculate things like average speed, fuel consumption, the rate or climb of descent and to convert miles to kilometers.
The charmingly busy Navitimer showed just how much functionality could be worn on the wrist, and it has been a favorite of aviators, as well as Breitling’s undisputed flagship watch, for nearly 70 years now.
With all of the advanced digital instrumentation available to today’s pilots, the practical use of the Navitimer as a usable tool has obviously decreased — though this same case can be made for basically all mechanical watches — but its popularity has endured thanks to the charm of wearing an overbuilt analog co-pilot on the wrist that was conceived at a time when there was legitimate need for such a thing.
Why It’s Significant: The first major design from Gérald Genta, who arguably would go on to become the most important watch designer in history.
There are a lot of heavy-hitter luxury brands from today on this list, like Rolex, Omega and Breitling, but unless you’re a watch buff or are very into vintage watches, you may not be familiar with Universal Genève. In the mid-twentieth century, UG was a major Swiss brand, creating some of the most acclaimed watches of the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s.
The quartz crisis of the 1970s took the wind out of its sails, and while it technically still exists today under a Hong Kong-based holding company, the brand hasn’t been relevant for decades. But go back 70 years and the Polerouter (or Polarouter, as it was first called) was making waves.
The watch’s designer was a 23-year-old Gérald Genta. Arguably the most impactful watch designer of all time, Genta would go on to spark the luxury sports watch craze of the 1970s by penning the Audemars Piguet Royal Oak and Patek Philippe Nautilus, but two decades earlier, he crafted the sleek and beautiful Polerouter for Universal Genève. While dressy in appearance by today’s standards, the Polerouter was a tool watch through and through. It was designed for and issued to the pilots of Scandinavian Air Services, who were the first to fly commercial flights over the North Pole between the US and Europe.
These polar flights were subjected to stronger magnetic fields than usual, and their pilots needed a watch that would hold up against those forces as magnetism and watches do not mix. As such, the Polerouter featured not only an eye-catching aesthetic but also a high degree of magnetic resistance, making it as useful a tool as it was a stylish accessory — a balance few watches have struck as well before or since.
Why It’s Significant: A revolutionary dive watch case design that was used by a number of brands, it increased water resistance the deeper it dove.
With the popularity of diving increasing exponentially in the 1950s, more and more people were diving with their watches. But many of the dive watches of the day were not able to withstand the pressures at great depths and could break if taken too deep underwater. That’s where Ervin Piquerez S.A., better known as EPSA, enters the picture. EPSA was not a watchmaker like the other brands on this list; it was a case maker.
Back in the mid-century, it was still common for watch brands to cobble together parts from a range of third-party suppliers — terms like “in-house” and “vertical integration” weren’t part of anyone’s vocabulary at the time. In 1956, EPSA patented its Super Compressor case. This case used increased pressure to its advantage, with a spring on the caseback that tightened the seal against the O-ring gasket as the pressure outside the watch increased.
Super Compressor watches also featured a dual-crown design that visually distinguished them from other dive watches. Their bezels were under the crystal and operated by one crown, with the other crown used for timekeeping. This design allowed for Super Compressors to be thinner and a bit dressier than traditional dive watches, and the style caught fire. Dozens of brands, from Bulova to Hamilton to Jaeger-LeCoultre, used Super Compressor cases for their dive watches throughout the 1950s and ’60s until watchmaking and case design technology reached the point where the spring-backed cases were no longer necessary.
But even today, the Super Compressor lives on in various forms. In 2020, Christopher Ward created the first functioning Super Compressor case in decades (its own design, not an EPSA case), and the Longines Legend Diver, introduced in 2007, thrives as a modern iteration of the twin-crown diver design seen on its own EPSA Super Compressor that first appeared in 1959.
Why It’s Significant: The first watch to display the full day of the week spelled out, it quickly became associated with world leaders and success.
You’re probably sick of Rolex by this point, but the 1950s really was the Rolex Decade. That’s mostly owed to the fact that it was a decade of tremendous exploration and dedicated tool watches designed to meet the moment — something at which Rolex has always excelled. But in the 1950s, just as today, Rolex wasn’t just a maker of tool watches.
The other half of the brand’s collection is composed of luxury dress watches, and none stand mightier than the Datejust. Nicknamed the “President” for how it eventually became popular among world leaders — LBJ was most responsible for perpetuating that reputation — the Day-Date, which has always been produced exclusively in full precious metals, has been the ultimate status symbol watch.
But the Day-Date was always more than just a showy timepiece for the rich and powerful. Like every other Rolex of the era, it also boasted some notable innovations, as it was the first watch to display the full day of the week spelled out on the dial alongside the date, hence the watch’s no-nonsense name.
This made it practical as well as attractive — an ongoing theme among the watches chosen for this guide — and represented another technical advancement in the fast-moving world of mid-century watchmaking. The Submariner may be the more popular watch, but the Day-Date will always be Rolex’s flagship, just as it was when it first turned heads in 1956.
Why It’s Significant: The first chronograph to feature an external tachymeter bezel, and a dozen years later, the first watch worn on the moon.
After the Rolex Submariner, the Speedmaster is arguably the most recognizable watch in the world — at least to watch enthusiasts. That’s largely because of its monumental status as the first watch worn on the moon’s surface, forever earning its place in history when Buzz Aldrin strapped his Speedy on his wrist before hopping off the lunar module during 1969’s historic Apollo 11 mission.
The Speedmaster’s association with space travel goes back even further than that. Astronaut Wally Schirra wore his own personal Speedmaster to space in 1962, and in 1965 NASA officially selected the Omega as the chronograph that would be issued to its astronauts for space flights after the watch outperformed competitors from Rolex, Breitling, Longines and others in a battery of tests.
The thing is, even if it weren’t for the Speedmaster’s now 60-year relationship with outer space, the watch would still be deserving of a spot on this list. The Speedy wasn’t initially designed with space travel in mind. It was launched as a racing chronograph, helping to pave the way for the motorsports craze that would greatly influence the watch world in the 1960s and 1970s.
The largest innovation from the Speedmaster was arguably its bezel, as it was the first watch to feature an external tachymeter bezel. This useful design feature, which made it easy to calculate speed using the chronograph, would become a hallmark of sporting chronographs moving forward. From the track to the moon and everywhere in between, the Speedmaster has been an icon for well over half a century.
Why It’s Significant: Omega’s first professional dive watch, it transformed the Seamaster line from a dress watch into one of the world’s best-known sports watches.
With the tool watch race kicking into high gear in the 1950s, Omega found itself with some ground to make up as the end of the decade neared. The brand did so basically in one fell swoop, launching a “Professional” trio of watches in 1957, each designed for a different demanding task. The Speedmaster was one of them, the lesser-known Railmaster — an antimagnetic watch aimed at railroad staff — was another, and the third was the Seamaster 300.
At this time, the Seamaster had been around for nearly a decade, first debuting in 1948 as a water-resistant dress watch. But the more specialized hobbies of the 1950s required more focused tools, and the Seamaster became a dive watch with the advent of the Seamaster 300.
The Seamaster 300 wasn’t necessarily revolutionary. It was a contemporary of the Rolex Submariner, released a few years after as a deliberate competitor, and it didn’t really rewrite the book on dive watches. But it became immensely popular as Omega’s first professional dive watch, and in the ensuing decades, Seamaster divers have had stints as a mil-spec diver issued to the British Navy in the 1960s and ’70s and as the official James Bond watch since 1995.
Today, the Seamaster is likely the second best-known dive watch in the world after the Submariner, and while the line contains a number of vastly different watches — from the Aqua Terra to the Planet Ocean to the Ploprof — the Seamaster 300 is the one most responsible for making “Seamaster” a household name.
Why It’s Significant: The first electric wristwatch and a precursor to quartz watches that would debut over a decade later.
Quartz technology wouldn’t make its way into wristwatches until the very end of the 1960s when Seiko unveiled the Astron on Christmas Day, 1969. That day would change the watch industry forever, but more than a decade earlier, the non-mechanical revolution had already begun.
Hamilton‘s Ventura debuted in 1957 as the world’s first electric wristwatch, with the Caliber 500 movement that looked much like a mechanical movement but with a battery-powered electromagnet in place of the mainspring driving power to the balance wheel. This meant the watch required no winding at all, a first for the industry.
This futuristic movement required an equally futuristic case, and Hamilton tapped lauded auto designer Richard Arbib to design the Ventura. He came up with an angular space-age design that looked like nothing else on the market, and for a brief moment in time the Ventura became the “it” watch. Elvis Presley was the Ventura’s most famous wearer, as he owned one and wore it on-screen in 1961’s Blue Hawaii. Rod Serling wore one on TV while presenting The Twilight Zone.
Even decades later, the Ventura’s futuristic look was so distinct that it was chosen as the agents’ watches in the 1997 blockbuster Men in Black and all of its sequels. While innovative, the technology powering the Ventura proved unreliable, and the watch was out of production by the mid-1960s — several years before the arrival of quartz watches. Still, it was the first shot across the bow in what would eventually become a war between electronic and mechanical watchmaking.
Why It’s Significant: The first-ever sports watch produced by Seiko, a brand today known for its wide range of dive watches, field watches and chronographs.
Seiko is a massive company that today makes watches for every need, taste and budget. But for the first few decades of its existence (the brand created its first wristwatch in 1913), Seiko exclusively produced dress watches, much like other brands pre-1950s. Then, finally, at the end of the decade, Seiko released the Laurel Alpinist.
The watch was designed with mountaineers in mind and had robust features like a screw-in caseback to prevent dust incursion, easy-to-read luminous markers and a shock-resistant movement. While in a vacuum, it may look like nothing special, the Alpinist is significant for what it represents.
By Seiko’s own admission, the watch was the first Seiko designed for sports use. Given that today the brand is recognized for its countless contributions to sports watches — from the Seiko 5 series to Speedtimer chronographs to countless divers like the 62MAS, SKX, Tuna, Samurai, Turtle and others — it’s wild to think they can all essentially be traced back to this relatively simple Seiko from 1959.
The Alpinist has had a few periods of resurgence in the decades since and is now considered a classic product line among the Seiko faithful, but the true impact of its legacy can be seen across the company as a whole and the massive impact it’s had in popularizing sports watches over the past 60-plus years.
Back in 2022, Nissan revamped the Z sports car line to take on the Toyota Supra, dispensing with the numbers in the name and just going by “Z.” The 2023 model year Nissan Z packed 400 horsepower, a six-speed manual, rear-wheel drive and retro good looks. It technically carried over the platform from the 370Z — which was ancient — but in this day and age, we take endangered sports coupes any way manufacturers can provide them.
The natural follow-up effort to the Z was a harder-edged Nismo (the Nissan Motorsports) version. And Nissan duly delivered it for the 2024 model year. The Z Nismo receives a massaged twin-turbo V6 pumping out 20 extra horsepower and 34 more lb-ft of torque. Nissan also threw in myriad upgrades such as wider rear wheels, grippier Dunlop tires, stabilizer bars and a revamped, firmer suspension.
We didn’t get to test the Z Nismo on track due to scheduling conflicts. But we had two Gear Patrol staffers sample the car on extended home loans in the Detroit and New York City areas. And while it has some things going for it, it’s a hard value proposition to justify.
The 2024 Nissan Z Nismo: What We Think
Tyler Duffy
We love the idea of a harder-edged Nissan Z car … on paper. And we concede that the Z Nismo is a looker. But it’s hard to get over that $64,995 price point — a higher starting MSRP than the BMW M2 — and the absence of a manual transmission that would have made it more straightforwardly engaging.
The modifications may be significant improvements, and this may be the apotheosis of what Nissan can achieve (given budget constraints) with this Z car. But it’s just hard to see what makes the value proposition worth it. We’d rather have the standard Z and $20,000-plus in the trunk.
To learn more about our testing methodology and how we evaluate products, head here.
The Z Nismo is really, really damn pricey
Tyler Duffy
We don’t normally begin car reviews talking price. But with the Z Nismo, that context is a lede we can’t bury. The Nissan Z Nismo starts at $64,995. Tack on the destination charge and floor mats, and you’re at around $66,500.
In a Z context, the Z Nismo is $22,780 more than the base model Z and $12,780 more than the loaded Z Performance — figures that make you question whether there is the requisite amount of Nismo baked into the recipe to warrant that outlay.
All those cars set an incredibly high bar for performance, refinement and ability to transition to everyday driving. And at this price, it’s more than fair to expect the Z Nismo to match them.
Nissan isn’t offering a manual in the Z Nismo
Tyler Duffy
Sports cars must engage the driver; there’s no point to them otherwise. Manual transmissions are more engaging than automatic transmissions. Yet the Z Nismo, a bit counterintuitively, only offers the Z’s less-desirable 9-speed automatic transmission.
A Z fitted with an automatic is quicker on track, which is no shock in 2023. But the real reason Nissan can’t offer it with a manual is that — even with five figures worth of upgrades — a standard automatic Z would be quicker than a manual Nismo.
I’m not a stick-shift absolutist. I think you can make the case that — especially with modern, probably over-powered performance cars — ripping through cogs on paddles like an F1 driver may be more fun than long-geared manuals you never shift into fourth while attacking a public road. And on my first drive in the Nismo, I was grateful not to have a stick when I was caught in stop-and-go traffic.
But for Nissan to win that argument, the automatic transmission needs to be really damn good, and the Z Nismo’s is merely fine. It’s not as surgical and crisp on the boil as the M2’s ZF eight-speed box. Manually shifting with the paddles comes with a distinct lag at public road speeds.
The Z Nismo is smoother when you let the software do the work (albeit with a penchant for shoving you up to 9th gear the second you lift a touch off the throttle). But who wants to let the software do the work in a sports car?
The Nissan Z Nismo does look pretty sweet
Tyler Duffy
Looks are a major reason people buy sports cars, and the Z Nismo does deliver on that front. It retains the Z’s classic silhouette. But a new, wider grille looks more natural than the squared-off one in the standard Z, and the red lipstick and lower bodywork add a bit of pizzazz.
I also think the two-tone paint — the only option unless you go black — looks great. However, I thought the “Stealth Grey” paint I had on the test car blended in a little too well with the Michigan fall weather. Go with red. Live a little.
But the Z Nismo is rather uncomfortable
Tyler Duffy
Taller drivers have noted issues with the regular Z, and my 6’4″ colleague Will Sabel Courtney confirmed that the Z Nismo did not resolve them; even with the seat all the way back, he was close enough to the wheel to steer with his knees. Even at my (still a couple of inches above average) 5’11” stature, it was a squeeze getting in and out. I considered making my TikTok debut with a compendium of old man noises I made getting in and out of it over a week.
The sporty bucket seats are fairly comfortable — at least by sporty bucket seat standards. But the Z Nismo counters that with a seriously firm ride — particularly over Michigan or New York Coty roads — that can’t really be mollified much with drive modes. The Z Nismo is the first car that has made me conscious of my nearly-40-year-old cheek fat being jostled. That wasn’t a pleasant feeling.
And the Nissan Z Nismo isn’t very practical
Tyler Duffy
Sports coupes don’t need to be practical per se. But I found myself spending a lot of time looking at the Z Nismo … as I walked on by to my VW for most of my weekly driving.
The lack of a back seat precluded using the car for kid pickups, drop-offs and sporting events. The cargo area isn’t wholly useless — my carry-on suitcase from the airport fit without incident — but it’s fairly close, due to its lack of vertical space. I had to do some reorganizing to fit even a moderate number of grocery bags in the slim space beneath the sloping roof.
Granted, the BMW M2 isn’t a bastion of sensibility. But little things like a practical trunk and rear seats just big enough to shoehorn a child into for a short ride make it far more useful.
And the Z Nismo didn’t behave very nicely on wet pavement
Tyler Duffy
One of the key upgrades Nissan made with the Z Nismo was its shoes: it boasts super-grippy Dunlop SP Sport Maxx summer tires. In dry weather on backroads, they worked well; the Z Nismo clung to the road like lingering self-doubt from my teenage years in my thoughts. But things got harrier — for both of our test drivers — in wet weather.
My first drive in the Nissan Z was home from Detroit’s Metro Airport. The rain was steady, but not monsoon-level. I entered the I-94 on-ramp, gave the Z Nismo some moderate throttle … and had the back of the car cut loose, nearly sending me spinning into traffic. I drove the rest of the way with very soft inputs and eventually returned to normal breathing. My colleague Will Courtney had a similar experience on the FDR Drive in New York in damp conditions; a moderate throttle input for a highway overtake caused the rear end to cut loose in 15–20-degree swings.
(Nissan noted that the cars were likely on the same tires that put in some hard miles with car journalists on track, which could have played a role in the lack of grip.)
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Cold, dry weather takes its toll on a burgeoning beard by turning whiskers rigid and dehydrating skin. That’s a recipe for beard dandruff, itching and split ends.
With insights from two industry pros, celebrity groomer Colleen Dominique (whose clients include Mark Hamill and Daveed Diggs) and barber Jovan Figueroa (ambassador for hair care brand Stmnt), we devised a thorough regimen packed with winter beard care essentials to prevent all your follicle follies.
An ultra-hydrating face wash freshens your dry winter beard and mitigates seasonal itching. Dominique recommends Caldera + Lab’s cleanser because of the brand’s natural-ingredient ethos, which ensures softness for skin and hair. “Massage one to two pumps, and use a beard brush to distribute through long beards,” she says.
To get further ahead of beard dandruff, scrub twice a week with a small-grain exfoliant, “which will penetrate a beard rather than sitting on top of it,” Figueroa explains. Olehenriksen’s scrub uses ultrafine volcanic sand as its grit, and it heats up on contact (a nod to the founder’s Scandinavian sauna culture).
Tom Ford’s lightweight top-shelf beard oil makes for a terrific stocking stuffer. “Think sophistication and masculine warmth,” says Dominique of its smoky-woody essence. It packs oils of almond, jojoba and grapeseed to replenish hydration, tame flyaways, neutralize dandruff and halt beard itch — no matter how low the temps go.
Winter-proof your beard with Reuzel’s nourishing and strand-coating balm, which acts like a hybrid conditioner and styler. “It makes the beard feel full and keeps things shaped all day,” says Dominique of the shea butter and argan oil recipe. For short scruff, she says to start with a pea-sized amount, working up to a dime size for longer styles.
Beardbrand’s beautiful boar-bristle brush and double-tooth comb should be on every bearded guy’s wish list. The static-free comb minds the details around your beard’s perimeter, plus it distributes beard oil to soften each strand. The stately brush helps detangle and build volume, ensuring you exercise the beard’s full potential. “A beard brush is a great way to fully work in any cleanser and exfoliant through your beard hair,” Figueroa adds. “Be gentle closer to the skin since it’s doubling up on exfoliation.”
It’s easy and inexpensive to upgrade from flimsy facial hair scissors to something durable that professionals would use. Ontaki’s Japanese-steel scissors will mind details like mustache curtains and unruly flyaways while giving high-quality heft in hand. Figueroa relies on them to target facial hair split-ends and dry beard itch, both of which increase in cold, dry weather.
Lamborghinis and the real world, traditionally speaking, have not been great bedfellows. Ferrucio’s mechanical prodigy have long been perfect for fantasy — be it on the silver screen, on the bedroom wall or for the perfect day’s drive through the Alps — but commuting to work, taking the kids to school or slogging across the land on an interstate highway are all tasks that Raging Bulls have been, shall we say, less than ideal for.
Admittedly, things have been growing better on this count. The Urus crossover, of course, is the clearest proof of that; set aside its extroverted exterior and it’s basically a Porsche Cayenne Turbo GT with Italian citizenship. But even Lamborghini’s sports cars have become more civilized with each generation: adding comfort features, growing easier to drive, enabling drivers to reverse without hanging out an open door.
The Huracan Sterrato, though, takes this trend in a new direction. Designed and presented as a sort of rally-spec exotic, it is, in truth, an application of sport-utility vehicle principles to low-slung supercars. And in some ways, that makes it better — perhaps not on racetracks or dream roads, but in the world most of us actually drive in every day.
The Huracan Sterrato may be the most unusual Lamborghini in ages; indeed, it’s arguably the vanguard of a whole new class of automobiles, the off-road sports car. It still delivers everything you’d expect from a Lambo, from exotic style to remarkable performance and advanced tech.
But it also holds an additional, separate appeal for many of the same reasons buyers in more proletarian classes choose crossovers over sedans. It rides slightly higher, and thus is easier to enter and exit; it has a taller suspension and bigger sidewalls, and thus rides more comfortably. Yet this comes at little cost to its acceleration, braking and handling — at least, at the limits drivers are likely to explore in real-world conditions.
Granted, of course, the Sterrato is not without eccentricities; the Huracan’s infotainment system remains maddeningly obtuse, and the optional roof-mounted spare tire is more trouble than it’s worth. Then again, without a few idiosyncrasies, would it even be a Lamborghini?
Very much a Lamborghini, very much ready for some soft-roading.Will Sabel Courtney
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The Sterrato tweaks make this the best Huracan for real-world driving
I hate making broad generalizations, but in this case, I feel safe in making the one above — even if it is one for a highly specific group of people. Most people who can afford a Huracan can also afford a much more usable daily driver, I presume; that said, if you are the sort of person who would daily an Italian supercar, the Sterrato is far and away the best choice.
The first reason: the off-road tires. The Sterrato wears custom-made Bridgestone Dueler AT002 tires, sized 235/40/19 up front and 285/40/19 in the rear. Compared with the Huracan Technica (or most supercars), there’s more sidewall, which means more give over bumps — and thus, a more comfortable ride.
The second reason: the added ground clearance that comes with the lifted suspension. The Sterrato’s undercarriage rides 6.73 inches off the pavement or dirt, 1.73 higher than a regular Huracan. Granted, more ground clearance doesn’t equal a lot of ground clearance; I still scraped the chin in my first 60 seconds of driving. Still, the boost definitely relieves some of the pressure to bob and weave around every pothole, manhole lip and other roadway imperfection — which, trust me, is very much an active source of anxiety when driving a low-slung supercar in a place like New York City.
Yes, in case you were wondering, that awesome black cover over the rear window makes it all but impossible to see out the back. Will Sabel Courtney
Performance on the pavement doesn’t really suffer in response, though, at least not at the speeds most (sane) individuals are likely to achieve. The claimed 0-62-mph dash of 3.4 seconds is just two-tenths behind the more-super-car-conventional Huracan Technica, but some of that can be chalked up to the latter’s extra 30 ponies; likewise the extra seven-tenths of a second it takes to vault from 0-124 mph, a task Lambo says takes 9.8 seconds n the Sterrato. Sure, top speed is limited to 161, but unless you’re on the track or autobahn, let’s face it, you’re not likely to go faster than that.
The Huracan Sterrato is an absolute blast
Even with the lifted suspension and the spare tire on top, the Huracan is still fairly short.Will Sabel Courtney
I aim to live my life with as few regrets as possible, but it seems likely I’ll always have one that I didn’t wring the Sterrato out harder during the brief time I had it. It was dropped off at my Manhattan apartment on Friday around midday and picked back up Monday morning.
Problem was, that weekend wound up being sandwiched between a pair of unusually long business trips, so I needed the weekend to unpack, repack and attend to domestic responsibilities — which left tragically little time for the Huracan. I would have loved to have thrown it around on some of my favorite dirt roads in the Catskills or whipped it through some snow-covered backroads in Vermont, but alas, my schedule allowed only for a quick blast up the Palisades to Harriman State Park and back.
Will Sabel Courtney
Still, I pushed it as hard as I dared given the circumstances … and even at those levels well below its absolute limits, the Sterrato proved a hoot. The 5.2-liter V10 remains one of the most engaging engines in the new car market, spinning up a mechanical symphony as it revs; I found myself holding low gears and zinging up towards the redline at every opportunity to savor in the sound as much as the immediacy of its acceleration.
The steering is precise, the car eminently placeable and the grip everlasting, even with those all-terrain tires on dry pavement. And hey, should you want to break the car loose, it’s not only happy to do so, it’ll even help, thanks to the brilliant Lamborghini Integrated Vehicle Dynamics “brain” introduced on the Huracan Evo that helps the car’s many computerized systems work in harmony. For Sterrato duty, the LDVI (as Lambo calls it) even picks up a new Rally mode for horsing around in the slippery stuff, like snow and dirt.
The Sterrato modifications arguably make this the coolest-looking Huracan
Not the best-looking Huracan, I should say; that would be the the Huracan Technica. (You can argue that style is subjective, but I’m writing this article, so hey, live with it.)
Will Sabel Courtney
The Sterrato, however, is unadulteratedly cool-looking — not in a classic, elegant way, but in a 10-year-old kid’s awestruck no-way-check-that-thing-out! kind of way. The knobby tires, angular flat black body cladding and added off-road lights on the frunk lid all add up to a Mad Max-of-Miami Beach aesthetic like nothing else on the road — and suck up attention like nothing else.
The roof-mounted spare is a terrible choice
Will Sabel Courtney
Presumably in an effort to maximize the wow factor for photos, Lamborghini’s U.S. P.R. department ordered my test car with the optional spare wheel-and-tire affixed to a bespoke roof rack atop the Sterrato. Its utility is marred, however, by the fact that the Sterrato has staggered-size tires, and the spare is only suited for the front ones; hit a nail or slice a sidewall at the other end, and you’re stuck calling AAA. Besides, the custom-made Bridgestones are run-flats capable of going 50 miles at 50 mph.
The real dealbreaker, though, is the effect of dragging a wheel through the air atop your Lamborghini. As you can imagine, this wreaks havoc on the car’s coefficient of drag. While Lamborghini owners might not mind the hit to gas mileage, they certainly will take issue with the racket it makes as it buffets itself against the breeze at highway speeds. North of 50 miles an hour, the noise becomes obnoxious to the point of distraction — and a Lamborghini that makes you not want to drive fast is one that defeats its own purpose.
Besides, if that wasn’t bad enough, the spare also blocks one of the Sterrato’s coolest visual features: the roof-mounted air intake for the V10, meant to spare it from the worst of dust when bombing down dirt roads. Should you be lucky enough to buy one, don’t bother with it.
Eric Perry Photography
