Holds poured at home by two brothers.

So iLL began with climbing holds made at home. The Daily Egyptian, the student newspaper of Southern Illinois University, reported in March 2012 that the brothers David and Daniel Chancellor, who grew up in DeSoto, Illinois, founded So iLL Holds in their parents’ basement, and that the holds were designed after the sandstone cliffs and boulders of southern Illinois. The paper named a third partner, Ian Anderson, a childhood friend, and said the three had backgrounds in construction, architecture and finance.

The name is a play on geography. Field Mag wrote in November 2024 that “So iLL” blends the name of the brand’s first home, Southern Illinois, and dated the start to 2002, when Dan Chancellor began hand-pouring unusual holds in the kitchen of a college rental house with the aim of creating “an indoor playground.” Two reports from 2012 put the start about nine years earlier, which fits the same period.

The early holds became the brand’s calling card. Climbing Business Journal wrote in July 2016 that So iLL was known for odd early shapes such as light bulbs, teeth and baby heads, and Field Mag still described the company in 2024 as known for its “baby head” holds.

A gym, then a shoe.

The brand is now based in St. Louis, Missouri, Field Mag says. There the brothers opened a climbing gym, Climb So iLL, in a renovated former power plant; SGB reported in April 2012 that the building had once served the city hospital, that the grand opening on 23 March 2012 drew more than 700 supporters, and that Adidas Outdoor had become the gym’s official outfitter. The Daily Egyptian quoted the gym’s motto, “Grounded in experience. Dedicated to the community.”

Shoes came next. In March 2016 Elevation Outdoors reported that So iLL was taking pre-orders on Kickstarter for six climbing-shoe models, from beginner to soft and downturned designs, with names including the Kick, Street and Runner LV, and a rubber the brand called “Dark Matter.” Climbing Business Journal reported that July that the shoes were designed with Didier Epain of the studio Think Think in Annecy-le-Vieux, France, a designer who had worked with Salomon, Petzl and Millet, and that the shoes were expected in shops that August. Field Mag later dated the footwear debut to 2018, so the sources differ on the launch.

The same 2016 article described the shoes as clean, simple and utilitarian with a retro look drawn from vintage shoes, made them unisex, and quoted Daniel Chancellor: “The demographic is us.” By then the range ran from holds to quickdraws, crash pads, chalk pots, hangboards and yoga tights. The magazine counted four shoe models in its report, aimed at beginner to advanced climbers and including low-volume “LV” fits, and said the brand was aimed above all at urban gym climbers of the Millennial generation. Daniel Chancellor told it: “We don’t pump out products just to pump out products to sell them,” and the long-time hold representative Chris Danielson credited the brothers’ success partly to “doing it their own way.”

Design and documentation.

The seven brands in this group all make equipment or clothing for climbing: Evolv, Mad Rock, Edelweiss, So iLL, E9, Red Chili and AustriAlpin. They cover shoes, ropes, holds, apparel and metal hardware such as carabiners and buckles, and they range from small founder-led workshops to names that now sit inside larger outdoor companies.

A climbing brand’s identity is usually carried by a logo stamped on a shoe heel, printed on a rope bag or engraved into a piece of metal, more than by any single advertisement. The company behind that mark may have changed owners, moved its factories or grown well beyond the town where it started, so the plain questions are worth asking for each name: who founded it, who owns it now, and where its products are actually made.

Each guide separates what independent sources record from what the company says about itself — its founding story, its owners over time, where it makes its products and how its marks have changed — and marks plainly what rests only on the company’s own word. None of these guides assesses how any product performs or how safe it is; that is a matter for the relevant standards and testing bodies, not a design guide.

A Swiss boulderer and a Hollywood actor.

So iLL’s later shoes leaned on two well-known names. Field Mag reported in November 2024 that the Roam line, in a soft and a rigid version, was co-created with Fred Nicole, the Swiss climber known for pushing boulder and sport grades in the 1990s, who developed prototypes after a relationship that began on Instagram. The magazine said the actor Jason Momoa had been linked with the brand since 2016, that his tattoos inspired graphics on accessories branded On The Roam, and that the laceless design came from his request, because he “really likes slippers.” Both Roam shoes, it said, have an unlined vegan microsuede upper with no laces or Velcro straps; the soft version has no midsole and suits slabs and newer climbers, while the rigid one gives more support on steep overhangs and roofs.

The same article described the Roam look as stripped back, with monochrome colourways and minimal graphics, and said all So iLL climbing shoes use Vibram XS Grip rubber, a change from the “Dark Matter” name of 2016.

Across that time the Chancellors have stayed the public faces of the company: Elevation Outdoors described Dan Chancellor as So iLL’s owner when the shoes launched in 2016, and Field Mag still told the story through Dan Chancellor in 2024. The brand’s site today offers shoes in youth sizes and a custom-fit 3D-printed children’s shoe called Baby Steps, and its social handle reads @takehold.

For a design guide, So iLL shows how a brand born in a basement can keep its joke of a name while its products grow quieter and more monochrome. Compare it with Butora and Five Ten, two other climbing-shoe names. For this guide we use gym black, bone and concrete with a sans, an unofficial interpretation; no product or logo is reproduced.

Keep So iLL’s identity on hand — save it to a board in the Made Good inspiration library.