About five years ago I bought two leather bags from a leather artist in Cherkasy, Ukraine. I thought they looked interesting.
That was apparently a mistake.
Because then I bought another one. And another one. 😄
The backpack in these photos is the oldest one I own. It’s been with me all over the place: New York, Switzerland, Venice, Scandinavia, airports, museums, everyday grocery runs…it pretty much became my default travel companion. It has held up ridiculously well.
The funny thing is that I wasn’t documenting the bags. I was documenting my trips. Then I scrolled through my photos one day and realized, “Wait… it’s the same bags over and over again.”
I used to collect luxury handbags. I’m actually selling most of them now because I rarely reach for them anymore.
What surprised me most isn’t even how they’ve aged. It’s that they’re just… nice to use.
The pockets are actually easy to get your hand into. (It sounds silly until you’ve owned bags that make you wrestle for your keys every single day.) They’re lightweight, even though they have lots of zippers and hardware, and I honestly have no idea how she manages that. They don’t have a lining, which I thought I’d miss. Turns out I don’t.
This year I bought one of the slings for my dad’s birthday.
Dad immediately decided it was a fanny pack.
Then he decided it was too big.
Then he decided he needed to punch another hole in the strap.
I may or may not have yelled, “DAD, STOP. THAT IS NOT HOW YOU WEAR IT.” 😂
Meanwhile my mom looked at it and said, “Oh good, I’ll borrow it.”
Once Dad actually started wearing it cross-body the way it was intended, he became a fan too.
The maker is Yana, and her brand is Devinet. Everything I’ve bought has been designed and hand-stitched by her. We actually became friends over the years because I kept buying her work.
I know five years isn’t exactly “for life” yet. Maybe in another fifteen years I’ll come back and update this post.
But if a bag survives years of travel, daily use, me stuffing way too much into it, and still makes me instinctively reach for it instead of everything else in the closet… I think it’s off to a pretty good start.