RIMOWA has taken a waffle iron to its signature aluminium cases. Or that looks to be the case (pun intended!) on its new luggage collection. 

Rimowa’s most classic bags — you know, the silver square cases with grooved lines on their shell — have been updated so that their external ridges form a grid. Sounds like a small update but it invites pretty drastic visual implications.

Since Rimowa’s aluminium bags are a design classic with an almost century-long history, any changes are instantly noticeable. But the grid case is downright transformative, rendering a recognizable design element almost unrecognizable. That makes the grid cases work better, though, because the momentary disorientation doesn’t change the fact that these are still Rimowa cases. 

The trio of German-made grid bags may be a fresh addition to Rimowa’s luggage selection, available for between $2,325 and $3,225, but they aren’t an entirely new idea. 

Rimowa first created gridded aluminium bags back in 1969, two decades after producing its first grooved suitcases, but this geometric pattern has been gathering dust in the archives since then. 

And it’s not the only cool thing Rimowa’s got lying around in the archives. Last year, the brand brought back a design from 1988 where its famously sober designs were renovated in poppy primary colors.  The year before that, it revisited the 1966 Hammerschlag collection, made to look like its suitcases had taken a beating from hammers. Just goes to show how many fun ideas are hiding in Rimowa’s 128-year-old archives.

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