This is the Nest Pour Over Set from VSSL, it’s a clever self-contained coffee making solution for when you’re hundreds of miles from the nearest kitchen (or espresso machine). It’s made up of four elements that all screw together, creating an easy-to-transport cylinder.
To use the set, you unscrew the parts, a 10 oz double-walled mug, a splashproof lid, a double walled pour-over coffee device, and a food grade stainless steel mesh filter. You then put your coffee grounds in the filter, and pour over your hot water – making fresh coffee right on your tailgate.
The Nest Pour Over Set is now being offered in six colorways, including Lightning Bolt, Sahara, Deep Moss, Black Driftwood, and Cream.
History Speedrun: VSSL
VSSL started out as a survival kit that was packed into the body of an LED flashlight. Company founder Todd Weimer grew up in North Battleford, Saskatchewan, in the 1980s and, as a boy, stored his outdoor essentials in a length of empty PVC pipe. 30 years later, when his own children started heading into the woods, he built prototypes to show them how he had once prepared, and those prototypes became the first VSSL products – the name is pronounced “vessel.”
The original design was an 8 inch by 2 inch aluminum cylinder with a compass in one end cap and an LED light in the other, its interior stacked with small cylindrical tins of gear – things like first aid kits, fire-starting materials, fishing lines, and a wire saw. Weimer took it to Kickstarter in September of 2014, where 630 backers pledged $76,927 CAD against a $25,000 CAD goal. The first products reached the market in mid-2015.
Coffee arrived in the VSSL range in 2020. The Java Hand Grinder went live on Kickstarter in August that year and closed with an astonishing $378,579 CAD from 2,432 backers. Weimer said at the time that he wanted to reach the point where a customer needed to provide only hot water and beans, and VSSL would take care of the rest.
The Nest Pour Over System followed in 2023, it built around a revised Java G25 grinder that had been trimmed 2mm in diameter so it would fit inside. Such was the success of the coffee-related VSSL gear that in 2024 the company announced that outdoor coffee equipment was now its sole focus, and it shifted away from survival gear entirely.
The VSSL Nest Pour Over Set
The Nest Pour Over Set is a four-piece brewing kit, it includes a 10 ounce double-walled mug, a double-walled cone-style dripper, a splashproof lid, and a reusable stainless steel mesh filter. Dual threads let the pieces screw together into a single cylinder 6.92 inches tall and 3.4 inches across, and the whole assembly weighs in at just 12.5 oz (354 grams).
To use the set, you unscrew the parts, a 10 oz double-walled mug, a splashproof lid, a double walled pour-over coffee device, and a food grade stainless steel mesh filter. You then put your coffee grounds in the filter, and pour over your hot water – making fresh coffee right on your tailgate.
The mug and dripper are made from 304 stainless steel with 80% recycled content. The mug is vacuum insulated, the dripper is double-walled to limit heat loss while the water passes through the grounds. The filter is 304 stainless mesh with PET threading, and the lid is a BPA-free food-grade polymer. The dripper will also sit on most ordinary mugs, and it can be bought on its own as a separate piece should you prefer.
The Nest Pour Over Set is now being offered in six colorways, including Lightning Bolt, Sahara, Deep Moss, Black Driftwood, and Cream. The MSRP is $55 and at the time of writing there’s a 25% discount, bringing the price down to $41.25 USD.
Images courtesy of VSSL
Articles that Ben Branch has written have been covered on CNN, Popular Mechanics, Smithsonian Magazine, Road & Track Magazine, the official Pinterest blog, the official eBay Motors blog, BuzzFeed, Autoweek Magazine, Wired Magazine, Autoblog, Gear Patrol, Jalopnik, The Verge, and many more.
Silodrome was founded by Ben back in 2010, in the years since the site has grown to become a world leader in the alternative and vintage motoring sector, with well over a million monthly readers from around the world and many hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.
