Leather Backpacks - Practicality & Fashion
Leather backpacks are the "bag of the moment" – fitting in with modern life seamlessly as they’re better for your back than a shoulder bag, they carry your tech in style and they keep your hands free to ride your bike, drink your coffee, talk on the phone (don't do this whilst riding the bike though please) – all whilst adding that extra something to your chosen style agenda.
At Vida Vida we have spent the last 13 years perfecting the most awesome leather backpack range. We thought it would be a nice idea to explain where our ideas come from and show just how good our handmade backpacks are.
Our first leather backpack was one that was of truly vintage style. The design is classically military based, although we chose to hand-make the entire backpack from leather whereas the original vintage styles generally used a combination of waxed canvas and bridle leather. We chose to use our unique “sun-tanned” leather as it has such a vintage character so it suits these styles perfectly.
Here it is:
We then went on to expand this range with yet more military inspired designs. We researched far and wide in a bid to make a leather backpack that was as suitable as possible for daily modern life. This meant a more rectangular shape was important to carrying a laptop securely, and that comfort and strength were key.
We came upon the roll-top backpack in our research, which was part military, part mountaineering in it’s historical design roots. We loved it and it ticked modern lifestyle boxes perfectly. We soon became one of the first leather goods companies to start hand-making our roll-top backpacks in our workshop.
This is our take on the roll-top backpack which we sell hundreds of:
We also realised that a singular leather bag that could be worn differently in different situations must be a good idea. So we set about designing a leather backpack that could be transformed quickly and easily into a leather satchel or a briefcase. This was actually more tricky than we first thought, so we went through a number of different convertible systems before we got it just right and came up with our 3-in-1 convertible backpack.
A classic vintage satchel combined with a classic vintage backpack:
After this our inspiration took a fast-forward through time to the 1980’s. This is when backpacks had their real mainstream fashion emergence. Modern synthetic materials were on the rise which made backpacks cheap to make and comfortable to wear – the start of throw away fashion was upon us, although we didn’t know it back then.
At Vida Vida we hand-make our backpacks from the finest leather and highest quality materials- so they’re built for a lifetime of use – a far cry from throw away fashion! But, we did love that classic 80’s backpack look – it was functional and comfortable too – so we went for it.
We decided to go "luxe" with this design – combining our finest leather with contrasting leather details inside – a fashion backpack, which still kept with our handmade ethic and it’s got to be functional mantra. It also comes in three lovely colours, black, dark brown and tan.
So here is our head turning backpack:
We then took a detour into the world of waxed canvas and leather. We loved the contrast of materials and it allowed us to re-look at the vintage military and mountaineering backpacks of the early 20th century again and we’ve always been self-confessed vintage nuts ever since we started our company when we sold our bags at London’s Portobello Market.
So we came up with a whole range of styles – all of which were ideal for a more outdoorsy lifestyle paired with modern everyday needs. It also allowed to keep prices down as we used less leather.
Here’s an example of what we came up with:
And now to the future, we’ve got some exciting prospects, which will be unveiled early this year, so please keep an eye on www.vidavida.co.uk if you’re in the market for a extra special leather backpack.
If you can't wait, then our full range of backpacks can be found here for men and here for women.