Kyle Hameister

Kyle Hameister grew up around art and heavy machinery with his father and their artist friends in the family garage. Between helping on large-scale sculptures built from rusty farm equipment and creating welded Shakespeare dioramas for English class, he was no stranger to working with his hands and pushing the limits of what could be made and why it should be that way. Kyle has always enjoyed tinkering with and improving household items, like fixing his vacuum and reupholstering furniture. He eventually honed these skills, pursuing a degree in Industrial Design from Denver's MSUD.

After a brief stint as head brewer of a local chai company, Kyle settled in, working through seven busy years of product design for the world's leading mannequin company. There, he touched every part of the development process: Concepting, directing mockup builds, producing renderings, and prototyping anything and everything. Moving into more of a back-end role, he eventually worked on developing standardized systems and products, requiring frequent travel for training and inspection. He ultimately became the leading internal technical expert between departments.

These days, from his studio nestled in the Colorado front range, Kyle provides a unique technical perspective while writing reviews for GearLab. He does his best to keep the alluring specter of yet more Colorado-based hobbies at bay and focuses on the basics instead: hiking, camping, biking, and skiing.