In an unmarked warehouse just outside of Charleston, South Carolina, wooden crates and cardboard boxes are waiting. Hulking, nondescript masses sit on shelves and floors around the warehouse. When it’s time, the half-assembled shells glide smoothly out of their protective shipping containers and onto […]
I’m driving around historic Charleston, South Carolina, in a refrigerated commercial van looking for ice cream. The temperature gauge reads just 91 degrees Fahrenheit, but it feels like 106 outside. The air conditioning is cranked to the max, making an icy dent in the sweltering […]
A young man wearing a black lab coat with “Prototipi” on the back and a raging bull over the heart is enthusiastically talking about the history of carbon fiber. Behind him a machine flexes a honeycomb panel almost 4 inches before the panel cracks like […]
Looks aren’t everything, but there’s no discounting that they matter, particularly in a place like tony Aspen, Colorado. This is the land where Hunter S. Thompson entertained Hollywood bigwigs and eventually shot himself, the place where women carry multiple Louis Vuitton handbags and brag to […]
Late last year, I had the opportunity to do a long-form piece on the history of driverless vehicles for Encyclopedia Britannica. It’s been an honor to work on the piece and to have it show up in their 2016 Book of the Year. You can […]
There is something romantic about cruising through a place that feels still somewhat wild and untouched. A place that has served as the crossroads for trade, culture, and war for centuries has plenty of stories to tell in its red-starred roadside markers and tiny houses […]
I sent my mom a photo of the grey, alien-looking sports car hunkered low in my driveway. “What is THAT?” She typed back. “McLaren 570S,” I thumbed at the screen, followed by an elaborate string of emoticons. The truth is there probably aren’t enough […]
I occasionally write for publications outside of the automotive realm and as a big foodie and fitness fanatic, I like to stretch my skills a bit and see what I can do. Recently I did a short trial with Eater Austin and put together a […]
The hipsters are dead. Long live the hipsters … or the yuccies. Or whatever you want to call them. Portland, Maine, is a city that’s grown more in the past 10 years than it has in the last 50. Though still peppered with lobstermen […]
It’s hard to get excited about most mainstream crossovers, but the truth is this is one of the hottest segments of the market right now. The automotive space is saturated with a glut of these profit-making, two-box, semi-practical, soft-roading vehicles, and the tide isn’t likely […]
Automakers keep talking about our “buttonless” future–one complete with touch screens, gesture tracking and voice control. Yet up to this point, they have roundly failed at making the most basic things like simple navigation as user friendly as possible. Mercedes is the latest to make […]
Time takes its pound of flesh from everyone. Butts sag, jowls wobble, bellies bubble over their beltlines, and while we are all flesh and bone, sometimes we feel compelled for help in fighting gravity’s pull. It’s as true for humans as it is for […]