A Long and Unparalled List Of World Beating Innovation

With such a long and distinguished resume of producing the worlds finest climbing gear it's difficult to produce a definitive list but here's an attempt to put it all in order and give an overview of some of the great gear we've made over the years....

1971 - 1978

1971 Ray Jardine begins the design process that would eventually produce the worlds first camming device the Friend

1972 Ray Jardine & Mark Valance meet at the Colorado Outward Bound School as fellow instructors.

1973 Ray creates the first working prototype Friend

1974 Ray attempts to climb The Nose in a day with the first rack of prototype Friends

1975 Ray Jardine introduces Mark Vallance to his prototype cams and the name Friend is coined

1976 Ray attempts to get Friends off the ground in the USA, but fails to get a backer

1977 Mark Vallance starts Wild Country and Ray Jardine comes to the UK to start up Friend production

1978 Production of Friends begins in Tideswell, in the Derbyshire Peak District

1979 - 1986

1979 Wild Country begins harness production in the Peak District and becomes the first manufacturer to use bar tacking.

1980 In collaboration with world renowned mountaineer Pat Littlejohn Wild Country launches the Littlejohn harness soon to become Britain's most successful harness.

1981 Mark Vallance launches Wild Country Rocks which were to become the first curved nut and the most most copied chock in the world and still remains the definitive design to the present day.

1982 Wild Country teams up with Wintergear tents.

1983 The Boreal ‘Fire’ the first proper ‘sticky’ rock shoe is distributed in UK by Wild Country

1984 Wild Country buys Winter Gear Tents & tent production begins in the Peak District.

1985 Wild Country USA formed with its base in New Hampshire.

1986 Wild Country buys Clog a classic British brand renowned to this day for its hardwearing gear.

In collaboration with Jerry Moffat Wild Country produces the Moffat Harness.

Wild Country design the definitive mountain geodesic tent the Quasar. Wild Country Rucsac production begins.

1987 - 1995

1987 In collaboration with Stefan Glowacz Wild Country produces the Glowacz Harness.

Wild Country wins the prestigious Queens Award for Export.

1988 Wild Country launches the first flexible stem Technical Friends. The Simond ‘Chacal’, the first Banana pick ice tool is distributed in the UK by Wild Country.

1989 Wild Country introduces aircraft technology to its production by developing Rotary Swaging for its flexible stem Friends. Wild Country launches Stones, radical new small crack protection.

1990 Wild Country launches the worlds first taped Gore-Tex mountain mitt.

1991 Wild Country launches its Extremities range with the first taped Gore-Tex winter mountain mitts and gloves.

1992 Wild Country launches Super Rocks a radical new take on the original Rock design.

1993 Wild Country sells its Tent business to the newly formed Terra Nova company.

1994 Wild Country launches a radical new range of rope control tools, the VC, SRC, Hand & Raptor.

Wild Country launches the first ever ‘Diecut Foam Laminate’ harnesses.

1995 Wild Country launches, what is at the time, the worlds smallest ascender the Ropeman MK1.

1996 - Present Day

1996 Wild Country is the first climbing equipment company to introduce 3 Sigma rating to all its sewn products.

1997 Wild Country launches Rockcentrics, a new hybrid chock combining the best of original Hexentrics with Mark Vallance’s groundbreaking Rock curve design. Strung on 12mm dyneema these become Wild Country’s biggest selling piece of pro for many years….

1998 Wild Country gets totally wired with the introduction of the Wild Wire the definitive wire gate karabiner and trhe first ‘mass-market’ wiregate biner.

Wild Country goes large with the humungous Technical Friends 5 & 6, fitting cracks up to 7.5inches.

1999 Wild Country launches Offset Friends designed to fits radical flared and tapered cracks.

The Ropeman MK2 adds more range and and durability to the smallest ascender in the world.

Wild Country introduces a new benchmark in Dyneema webbing technology 12mm Dyneema, which is narrower and lighter than anything else on the market.

2000 Wild Country starts to distribute the radical new rock shoe company Red Chili.

2001 Wild County buys part of the Red Chili brand and relaunches it with radical new shoes, the Dos Equis and Habanero.

2002 Wild Country launches the smallest camming device in the world with the introduction of Zero Cams. The Zero 1 fitting cracks down to an incredible of cracks 5.5mm.

2003 Wild Country launches the radical Helium karabiner - the lightest strongest full size karabiner in the world, using computer aided design this radical new wire gate karabiner features a patented clean nose and weighs only 33gms.

Wild Country leaps ahead of the competition with the all new Ziplock buckle and two radical new ranges of harness, the Helix and Matrix ranges.

Wild Country does it again and sets new standards in webbing technology with 10mm Dyneema.

2004 Wild Country Rocks are updated to become Anodised Rocks, lighter and with new bigger sizes they are colour coded for easy identification. Not content with updating Rocks a new range of mono cabled Superlight Rocks sets new standards in weight saving and placement possibilities.

The Matrix harness range is also expanded with the Matrix Lite and Matrix Supalite harnesses.

2005 Wild Country launches the Xenon a lightweight full size wiregate biner; an ‘no-hook’ nose locking biner the Oxygen; and a brilliant new belay device the VC Pro.

Top News Story