You've heard the phrase "A dog is a man's best friend," right? Let's modify that a little bit. "A talking and perpetually hungry purple backpack is an eight-year-old Hispanic girl's best friend."
I don't know why I'm spending so much time on this whole Dora the Explorer thing, it was really just a segue into the theme of this post: backpacks.
Being a student, backpacks have been a huge part of my life since I was a wee little munchkin. For a while I went through a phase in middle school when I deemed backpacks totally dorky and religiously carried a tote bag to hold all of my homework and supplies. Needless to say, it was quite difficult to find anything at all in the bottomless hole that is a shoulder bag. Hand sanitizer spilled in there more than once (three times, to be exact), making my math notebook all crinkly. Damn you, locomotive cleanliness! As I entered high school, however, I went back to my old friend. Partly because I'd gotten a really intense Hurley one for free from the Apple Store for sending me a broken computer (on my birthday, nonetheless) and partly because I figured I needed to be mega organized for my freshman year. It turns out that it was not only I that had made the switch; the rest of my new school's population had stopped giving backpacks the cold shoulder--pun intended--and brought them back into their lives. Did you see that? I just packed two backpack puns into one sentence. <--I'm just on a roll here guys.
As a strong believer in the philosophy that oftentimes trends start with the people, not the runways, I will show you some examples of the rise of the backpack. It hasn't just recently become popular amongst angsty teenagers: this trend has gone mainstream. Bloggers are wearing them, Urban Outfitters has their models wearing them, real people are wearing them. This is legit.
Madeline Pendleton of Jean Greige wearin' a backpack!
A model wearing the Deena & Ozzy Pop High/Low Backpack in the Urban Outfitters summer catalogue.
The infamous Phillip Lim denim vest/backpack hybrid. I tried to find it online for you, but it's sold out. Probably because the Man Repeller did a very convincing post about its versatility.
And now for the high fashion examples. Okay, I admit that Phillip Lim's bag technically should belong in this section but shhhhhhhhhhhhhwhwhwhwhwhhhcatshshshhwhwhshhhhhh.
Left: The Row leather backpack Right: Carven suede backpack
Left: Jeremy Scott backpack Right: Marc by Marc Jacobs backpack
Backpacks are practical, guys! They let you carry all your crap around while applying equal pressure to both of your shoulders instead of just one. That sounds like a terrible disadvantage, but I promise it's much better that way.
The trick to wearing the backpack correctly is to made sure your choice fits into one of the following categories: old school, sophisticated or made of an unconventional texture.
Backpacks that are very '90s and/or homemade-looking are really rad right now. They're more for people who are kind of badasses or whose style comes off as slightly punk and grungy. Think along the lines of: "Yeah I wear a mutha uckin' (Flight of the Conchords reference, anyone?) backpack, come at me ho."
Sophisticated and streamlined backpacks are very modern. They're for the person who has a somewhat minimalistic fashion sense or who wants to a simple yet beautiful carryall that can hitch a ride on their back and give their arms a rest.
Backpacks made of unconventional textures such as denim, leather, suede, or corduroy are legitimately dominating the trend scene here. If you didn't notice before, take note now that the majority of the backpacks I showed you up above are in fact made of denim, leather, suede, or some other cray-cray material. The Marc by Marc Jacobs one looks like it could be made out of raincoat fabric (aka a combo of plastic and rubber and some other weird-as-hayyyl things).
Among us youngsters, some fairly popular places to get some relatively inexpensive but totally jammin' backypackies are Urban Outfitters, ASOS and Fjällräven. My friend Kimberly also recently got a pretty damn cute one from JCPenney. I suggest checking out all those places if you're in the market for one of these little fellas.
It's summer. Getchyo' flippyfloppies and yo' backypackies and yo' jimmyjammies out.
I'm done with my freshman year of high school, guys! Just two Regents tests next week and I am peacin' out for good. See ya on the flip side biyatches.
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