Arc Vault Wallet: Unboxing and First Impressions

A Chromatic Design: Shine Bright

The first thing you will notice, and something that cannot truly be experienced from product images, is the chrome or reflective design of this wallet. The Vault is essentially one large mirror, and its chrome aesthetic is very much a conscious choice by the brand, mirroring (no pun intended) the look of everything else in Arc’s range. While design is entirely subjective and in the eye of the beholder, I do have some opinions and a few things prospective buyers should keep in mind.

The first is the reflective nature of the wallet. Look, everyone is different, but I am personally not a huge fan of how reflective this thing is. It does not matter what angle I turn it to, I am always having to stare at my own face, and it catches reflections left, right and center. This is very subjective, so take it with a grain of salt.

The second and most glaring issue is that this wallet attracts fingerprints like nothing I have ever used. The term fingerprint magnet was a common complaint with early smartphones made from shiny silver or black plastic, and no matter how much or how little you handled the phone, it was always covered in smudges, grime and the imprints of your fingers. The Arc Vault is exactly the same. From the second I started using it, the thing was covered in my fingerprints, immediately taking away from the clean, shiny chrome aesthetic the brand prides itself on. It starts to look dirty quickly, and there is nothing you can really do about it beyond getting used to it, or carrying a soft microfiber cloth wherever you go. Not ideal.

The thing is, that chrome look is consistent across everything Arc makes. The way I see it, if you are already a fan of their range, you are probably at peace with fingerprints. That said, Arc also produce plenty of goods with matte finishes, and a matte wallet would solve both problems at once: no endless reflections and far fewer fingerprints. Going back to the smartphone comparison, there is a reason almost every phone released today has abandoned that shiny, fingerprint-absorbing finish in favor of matte metal.

There is one more thing I noticed on the Arc Vault’s product page that might explain the chrome approach despite the issues I have raised. A lot of the product shots feature women using the wallet, and as far as I can tell, using it as a mirror in the way you would a compact. I do not know whether that is a deliberate design choice, and I can only go off the images on their website, but it would make a lot of sense.

Storing Your Cards: An Innovative Sliding Mechanism

It is not just the bold design that catches your attention with the Arc Vault, but its unique way of storing and accessing your cards. Last year a new style of wallet hit the market, one I have taken to calling a fan wallet. Cards are stored within a central opening and released with a flick or slide of a finger. The wallet opens up and your cards spread or fan out, revealing each one in turn. You pick the one you want, pull it out, pay, and put it back.

Aside from the Arc, the only other wallets I can think of that use a similar mechanism are the original Shuffle Wallet and the Slidemorph, two Kickstarter success stories, with the Shuffle being the first to invent this style, or at the very least to popularize it. I own the original Shuffle, and to say I was less than impressed would be an understatement. I admired the innovation, but in reality the mechanism was clunky and simply not as easy to use as countless other wallets on the market.

So when I first saw the Arc Vault I was both optimistic and skeptical about how it worked, and whether it would suffer the same problems as the Shuffle. Luckily, Arc have taken an entirely different approach, and before I even had it in my hands I could tell things were going to be better. The way cards are stored is intuitive, the sliding action takes minimal effort, and the spread of the cards is cleaner and easier to get at.

But my early impressions are mixed. Although the mechanism is better than the Shuffle’s, using it has thrown up a few issues. The video above gives you a proper look at how it works in practice. Before I get into those issues, I want to preface this by saying my use of the wallet is still very early, and it is clear from the start that there is a bit of a learning curve here.

The first issue, and a small one, is getting cards into the wallet. Because of the way it fans, cards do not go in straight. You have to place each one at a slight angle to work around the curvature of the mechanism. It is easy enough to get used to, but it is irritating at first, and the same applies when putting a card back. If you do not position it carefully, the card will not sit properly and will ride upwards, so a little of it pokes out of the top of the wallet. Not a dealbreaker, but worth noting.

The second issue was learning where to swipe to open it reliably. The idea is that you hold the wallet in one hand, swipe with your thumb, and you are ready to grab what you need. That takes some finesse and some playing around. The position of your thumb makes a big difference to how easily the wallet opens: I found you need your thumb very close to the middle of the outside left edge to get enough purchase to flip it open properly.

My First Impressions: My Thoughts on the Arc Vault

On quality and design I really do have to give this wallet credit. The construction is excellent and the design is like nothing else on the market. It is genuinely beautiful and it cannot really be compared to anything else out there. That said, if you think fingerprints are going to annoy you, as they did me, this one might not be for you. I appreciate the chrome look, but I would love the option of a matte version so the reflections disappear and the fingerprints are minimized. Perhaps that is something Arc has in the pipeline.

Then there is the mechanism. It is fair to say I have been fairly critical of this wallet so far, so I want to be clear that these opinions come from three days of ownership at the time of writing. As I said, there is a learning curve: working out the right amount of swipe pressure, and how to insert cards so they do not catch and sit properly. You could argue that a wallet you have to learn to use is not a good wallet in the first place, and there may be some truth in that.

I will end by saying that I am holding my reservations about the real functionality and usability of this wallet until I have used it properly, and I will give a final verdict in my full review later this year. For now, it is a beautiful design with excellent construction, and my only immediate gripe is how badly it attracts fingerprints. The mechanism has real potential and it is a novel, minimalist way to carry cards. For more information on the Arc Vault, check out Arc’s official website using the link below.

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