Unlike my usual preference for very structured bags, the Madewell leather is soft, yet thick enough at first use for the bag to stand on its own. Due to the type of leather and how it wears over time, no two will look alike. Even fresh out of the protective plastic when I picked her up from Nordstrom, the wear in the leather had begun, but in a patina type manner.
It comes with two strap options, one for hand and arm carry, and another removable, adjustable leather strap for shoulder and cross-body carry.
It is a simply designed, made for life vegetable-tanned leather tote that smells heavenly even up to two weeks later! (anyone love the smell of new fresh leather!?) No fussy external pockets, exterior prints, textures or patterns to be had. But after holding in hand and using every day, it has an understated type of elegance to it. AestheticĪt first glance, the bag is honestly nothing special, and a possible reason I overlooked this it for quite some time.
ROAD TRIPPER OVERALLS MADEWELL FULL
The winner: The Madewell Zip Top Transport Carry-All! And seeing as I just got home from my first week long business trip with this bag in tow, I thought it would be a good time to give a full product review. And due to my sometime indecisive nature, I took to Instagram to let my audience decide. I went back and forth for days and compiled a list of 6 options. My budget was less than a third of my dream bag, so the lengthy search for a high quality, travel friendly, laptop compatible work tote under $200 was underway. And don’t even get me started on the work tote of my dreams from Philip Lim that runs a very cool $895. I fell in love with the Tory Burch Gemini and Robinson totes, commanding $285 and $390 respectively. For something so commonplace as the work tote, my expectations were to find good quality for minimal pricing, but that was far from the truth. And one thing I discovered very quickly…they are NOT budget friendly. The search for a perfect work bag began innocently with Google searches, YouTube reviews and DMs to my favorite corporate-minded bloggers on their recommendations. It would be great for a shorter commute, or as a non-work tote, but this one just did not suit my needs, quality aside. So all of that combined, the defective bag was promptly returned to the store, and I am again on the hunt for a durable, travel work bag. And on a much less impactful note, the leather had begun to show significant wear, but not in a “fine leather patina” kind of way rather larger scuffs from doing things like placing under plane seats and setting on the floor in conference rooms. And the more you put into it, the heavier it became (obviously), but as the hand and shoulder straps are thin in both width and depth, the digging was all too real while lugging it from gate to gate. I was only gone for two nights, but it became increasingly difficult to place my laptop, charger, headphones, notebook and wallet within the tote. While in the airport on my way home from a work trip (the worst situation possible), the zipper broke and it was unable to be zipped closed-the most important factor in purchasing a work travel tote, second only possible to size…and it flopped in this area as well. Unfortunately, not a week after writing this review, the tote fell apart on me. It had it’s flaws, but I was willing to overlook due to all of the positives. As you will read in the body of this review, after my first trip with the Madewell Transport Carry-All, I was here for it. Updated 04/11/19: I wanted to write a quick update…and it’s not so favorable toward this tote.
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