Well I haven’t designed a Wallet ever, but I do always use one, and hence have bought quite a few of them in the past. And every time I’m at the stores having a look around, I’m kind of surprised upon seeing certain widely-prevalent elements in their designs which make very little sense. They appear to be predominantly designed for people with a certain kind of a lifestyle only, which is unfair and illogical. So I thought I’ll try to think of some basic pointers which in my opinion and as per my experience should be considered while designing men’s wallets. Here we go:

1. Yes, we do use coins!

I’m quite surprised to see the no. of wallets in the market that either don’t offer any provision for storing coins or are extremely ill-equipped for the purpose. Coins do fatten up the wallet but to discourage their storage through such measures is quite ridiculous. Loose change is needed for a no. of purposes here in India and hence should definitely be considered for. A well-designed enclosure that allows a decent no. of coins to be stored along with ensuring that they are uniformly spread across the surface of the wallet (keeping it thin), rather than sagging down to one-end, would be lovely. 

2. No, the male posterior isn’t flat.

Well that’s a well-known fact. So there is no point making a flat product if it’s not going stay flat. Wallets start warping awkwardly the moment we start using them, and eventually taken on some weird shapes depending on how the items inside are place for long. How about a more complimentary form though still ensuring that items like credit/visiting cards retain their flat shape? 

3. Make it thin.

Nothing feels worse than a fat wallet, no matter what the advantage. So features that add up to that thickness like additional folds (tri-fold wallets), thick material, loop buttons etc. should be avoided in my opinion. Intelligent distribution of space within the wallet, as well as more efficient ways to store items (such as coins) can also counter unnecessary addition of bulk. 

4. Allow customization.

The kind of items and their quantities that people carry in their wallets vary; some carry a lot many credit/debit cards, some prefer to carry a lot of coins for their own practical reasons, while many like to carry a lot of cash, and so on. So other than offering different variations of wallets for all these different people, it could be a good idea to allow people to customize their wallet e.g. the wallet could comprise of large open areas which people can customize using some of the accessories that come along at the time of buying. It could be an interesting experiment to see how people react to freedom of this sort.

5. Expandable Spaces

Certain items that we carry in our wallets like coins, cash tend to undergo quite a bit of variation, from a lot to none. Thus rather than permanently allocating certain volume to them, it would be good idea to offer a detailing that allows certain areas to expand when needed e.g. use of a flexible material at the edges that allows the space to expand when stuffed with more than normal quantities.

Thus to summarize, a well-designed wallet for standard usage should adhere to the following basic functional characteristics :

* gives an impression of being capable of storing all that the customer wants to in an adequate manner, at the time of buying. 

* is comfortable and convenient to use and carry.

* allows customization as per personal needs and under certain circumstances.

* looks good even when used over time.