Kites as the fine art of enjoying the wind.

Into The Wind is a kite shop and mail-order business in Boulder, Colorado. Its “About Us” page, read in October 2026, opens with this line: “From the beginning, we’ve viewed kites as the fine art of enjoying the wind.” The company says it was founded in 1980 by two architects, George Emmons and Jim Glass.

In the company’s telling, the two founders were the whole business for years. They test-flew and photographed the kites, produced the catalogue, took and shipped the mail orders and ran the shop seven days a week. In their spare time, the page says, they also designed and made several kites of their own, which the shop still sells.

The shop has stayed in one part of town. The company says that for years it has called Boulder’s Pearl Street Mall home, and it runs its website and mail-order service from the same building as the shopfront. It describes the premises as a turn-of-the-century building on the first block of the pedestrian mall, between 14th and 15th Streets.

The online shop has a long history of its own. The Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine holds captures of the intothewind.com address from July 1997, and the current website says the company ships worldwide directly from its retail store in Boulder.

Stunt kites, single-line kites and wind art.

Into The Wind sells kites from other makers alongside a range under its own initials. Its website, read in October 2026, lists kites marked ITW, such as the ITW Kid’s Delta Kite and the ITW Alpine DC Kite, among its best sellers, next to stunt kites from other brands — including the Zenith 5 delta from Prism Kites of Seattle.

The ITW kites are presented as the shop’s own designs. Their product pages, read in October 2026, list the manufacturer as ITW. The company describes the Alpine DC as a light-wind kite, saying that when the wind is unreliable “we reach for DC’s”, and that it made the Alpine bigger and lighter in an effort to improve on its best fliers; the page gives its materials as ripstop nylon with wrapped fibreglass spars. The Kid’s Delta Kite, also in ripstop nylon on fibreglass spars, comes with nylon tails attached by Velcro, which the company says make it easy to launch, and is sold ready to fly with line on a handle and a fabric case.

The catalogue is organised the way a kite flier thinks. Stunt kites are sorted into beginner, intermediate and advanced, with separate sections for light-wind, trick, power and speed kites and for quad-line kites. Single-line kites are grouped by shape: delta and DC kites, box kites, diamond kites, dragon and octopus kites, foil and sled kites, and gliders.

Wind is the thread through the rest of the shop. A wind art section sells lawn spinners and wind wheels, windsocks, hanging twists and spinners, flags and banners, and wind chimes. Beyond that the store has grown into a toy shop, with wind-up toys, retro toys and games, outdoor games, puppets, puzzles and a skill toys section that covers juggling, yo-yos, footbags and puzzle cubes.

The company says it aims to carry “only the best” and offers a satisfaction guarantee, promising a refund or exchange on any purchase that does not satisfy.

Design and documentation.

Kites and yo-yos are among the simplest objects in the toy trade: a frame and a sail on a line, or two halves joined by an axle and a string. Yet the names behind them range from small workshops and specialist shops to companies that sell through toy chains, sports retailers and their own websites, and some have changed hands more than once along the way.

These are toys that are meant to be performed. Kites are flown in public, on beaches, fields and at festivals, and yo-yos are thrown in front of friends, teachers and contest judges, so their brands often travel through demonstrations, events and the people who use them as much as through packaging. Colour, a clear name and a recognisable shape do much of the work when the product is seen in motion or at a distance.

Each guide separates what independent, dated sources record from what the company says about itself — who started it, who owns it now, where its products are designed and made and how its look has developed — and marks plainly what rests only on the company’s own word.

A shop, a catalogue and a place.

Into The Wind is a different kind of kite brand from a maker such as Prism or HQ. Its identity rests less on a factory or a signature model than on a place and a way of selling: a shopfront on a pedestrian mall in Boulder, and a catalogue that, by the company’s account, its two founders photographed and produced themselves.

The catalogue that built the business is now gone in print. On its frequently-asked-questions page, read in October 2026, the company says it discontinued its print catalogue in 2020, and that its current range is available on its website, with questions answered by email or telephone. Orders are still shipped from Boulder, by the US Postal Service as standard for international parcels, with long kites sent by other carriers on request.

That history explains the tone of its pages. The company’s own account of itself talks of “helping other people enjoy the wind”, invites visitors to come and see the shop if they are ever in Colorado, and gives directions from Denver to the parking garage near the mall. Its kite descriptions are written for fliers choosing a skill level and a wind range, rather than for collectors.

The range follows the name. Alongside kites, the shop sells things that turn, spin or sound in moving air, from lawn spinners and windsocks to wind chimes.

For a design guide, Into The Wind shows how a single shop can become a brand through its catalogue, its location and a clear point of view. Compare Prism Kites, the Seattle sport-kite maker whose designs it stocks, and HQ Kites, the German stunt-kite and wind-toy brand. For this guide we use a foothill green, a kite red and a sun yellow with a serif, an unofficial interpretation; no product or logo is reproduced.

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