What QWSTION is known for

Zurich bag brand founded 2008 by five designers including Christian Kaegi and Hannes Schoenegger, who wanted an everyday bag that didn't look like cycle-courier gear; developer of the Bananatex textile.

QWSTION was founded in 2008 in a former industrial district of Zurich by a group of five: Sebastian Kruit, industrial designers Christian Kaegi and Fabrice Aeberhard, graphic designer Matthias Graf, and Hannes Schoenegger. Their starting brief was simple — they wanted a bag that could take them from a bike commute straight into a meeting without carrying an obvious 'cycle courier' look, and found nothing on the market that fit.

The brand's best-known material development is Bananatex, a woven textile made from the fiber of Abacá banana plants, developed as a durable, biodegradable alternative to synthetic technical fabrics. QWSTION has been B Corp certified and won the Design Preis Schweiz in 2019 as well as a German Sustainability Award, recognition tied specifically to its materials research rather than general product design.

Operations today split between the Zurich studio, where the brand originated, and Tyrol, Austria, where much of the day-to-day operational business is now run — a structure that has evolved as the company has grown beyond its original founding city.