Rolling out safety: How a student inspired a new gear solution

Keeping all of the items in WTA’s gear library in top shape and ready to lend out takes a lot of work. Since fall, Students with the BRIDGES program have been coming weekly to the Seattle Gear Library to assist with general maintenance and cleaning.

Is there a safer way to manage a camp kitchen box? 

While cleaning a kitchen kit, one of the students, Weyland, noticed that it was easy for the knives to fall out of the storage containers, which left them loose in the kitchen kit. For many years, our knives were stored in sheaths and then tucked inside a section of old firehose. But, it was possible for the knives to slip out of the firehose. While they were still in a sheath, it wasn’t an ideal system. 

“All the knives were floating about and I was worried they would hurt someone,” Weyland said. 

This led to the question, is there a safer way to do this?

Our old kitchen kit set up did not have an organized way to store our utensils.

We previously stored the knives in a repurposed section of firehose. 

Roll it up! Student idea transforms camp kitchen storage 

Weyland suggested to Sarah Williams, the Outdoor Leadership Training coordinator, that something similar to a chef’s knife roll might be the ticket. In addition to the knives, the other utensils would sometimes float around the kitchen kit and often got lost inside pots. The knife rolls could be customized to include all utensils, which would not only make the knife storage safer but also improve the entire kit’s organization. 

“I have memories of a camping trip where someone had something like [a knife roll],” Weyland said. “I remembered this and thought it could be a good solution for the knives while not overstraining the budget for something like a bespoke case for each set.”

Sarah reached out to a gear repair partner, Switchback Repair, about Weyland’s idea. Switchback collaborated with Sarah and Weyland about the design specifications and created a custom utensil roll to fit all of our kitchen kit utensils. Weyland’s creative solution inspired our South Puget Sound Gear Library to request these custom utensil rolls for that location as well, for a total of 12 utensil rolls. 

Weyland said “(The new design) works for the needed purpose, and it is cost effective and will reduce the strain of trying to pack efficiently."

Our new utensil storage includes customized pockets that holds each utensil and prevents them from slipping out.

When rolled up, the new utensil storage is compact and fits nicely into our kitchen kits.

On the surface, this is a story about utensil storage. But it’s so much more than that. It’s a story of a community coming together to find a solution to make it easier and safer to maintain our Gear Library resources. And that gives our staff and volunteers more time to focus on other projects to support our work to help kids get outside. 

Thank you to Weyland, students and educators with the BRIDGES program and Switchback Repair for your continued partnership in keeping our OLT gear library program running smoothly!