Traverse is a folding grill that deals with the major issue of modern tailgating—dealing with the huge amount of stuff required on gameday. The grill is designed to be slim and stackable for packing and storage, pop open to carry everything you need for your tailgate, and quickly and effortless unfold to let you grill with the best.

I set out to solve some of the fundamentals issue with tailgating—storage, stuff, and setup. Existing grills are bulky, miniaturized versions of their larger counterparts. They take up more space than necessary, are difficult to pack, and are nearly impossible to carry in a mid-sized car or SUV. Stuff is a problem we all know too well—tailgating requires a ton of supporting gear to make happen. Whether you're hauling a cooler full of ingredients, ice, and beer; or a few camping chairs for your guests. I wanted to design a grill that could do more, a grill that could help make your gameday a little easier. Lastly, the grill needed to be unbearably easy to setup and use. No complex folding mechanisms, no flimsy plastic shelves, no separate propane tank that you're not sure how to carry. Just a barebones, easy to use design that makes setup and cooking 'obvious'.

As a designer, I try to focus on bring a systems-level thinking down to a product scale. Looking at a products scale of interactions, and trying to deep dive to understand the system as a scale. It might sound silly, but redesigning a grill for tailgating wasn't really about the grill—it was about focusing on the entire experience, the entire system. The grilling itself is fairly simple, but stepping back showed where most tailgating grills lacked design: the setup and prep process.

My process focused on diving into what was needed for tailgating, trying to understand what about tailgating people enjoy, what about it specifically to people not enjoy. College gamedays became my ethnography, and grilling out became my user field studies. My design process was based on iteration and modeling. The idea of a slim grill that carries stuff was designed through 2D drawing, but understanding how that related to the human scale was a challenge that demanded modeling, and lots of it. I started at smaller scale models to develop an understanding of proportion and folding. Those models grew in fidelity, eventually evolving into full-scale cardboard mockups and prototypes. I was able to unfold and setup the grill exactly how I'd be asking people to—then go back to the drawing boards and refine those ideas and start modeling again.

This product is designed to make people happy, to make people's tailgating experience easier. It's impact is in using design to help people enjoy a past time that is so common throughout America.

As I have displayed the grill, it's marketed towards the American idea of 'tailgating'—the act of preparing food with friends and family before a game, concert, or other event. However, as a designed object intended on allowing people to pack, move, and cook easier—it's an artifact that speaks to across cultures. The idea of a mobile, social gathering over food is a global concept.

Since Traverse is just a grill, it doesn't explicitly favor any food or nutritional agenda. You'd be just as successful grilling a cheeseburger as you would a piece of fish or vegetables.