Skeletal muscle design studies, based on anatomical structure, extend back several hundred years. Accurate anatomical drawings show that many muscle fibers are oriented at an angle relative to a muscle’s axis of force generation. This pennation angle has been reported in the skeletal muscle biomechanics literature, primarily in the context of trying to understand muscle force generation. In this perspective, I will describe several discoveries that changed my understanding of pennation and I will suggest that muscle pennation has little if any functional significance. I believe that the correct view of pennation is that it represents a packing strategy whereby short fibers can be packed into a limited volume. While surface pennation angle is easily measured, is very descriptive, and changes during force generation, I believe it has no functional significance.