REVIEWED: Vivienne Westwood x The Cambridge Satchel Company

When Teen Vogue and Vanity Fair both recommend a collab, then it’s the collab for me.

I've admired Dame Vivienne Westwood since her retrospective back in Canberra’s National Gallery of Australia, when I was a teen. And I've admired The Cambridge Satchel Company since I spotted it on the BagaholicBoy blog.

I ended up with the Vivienne Westwood x The Cambridge Satchel Company tiny satchel in navy and orange.

 

Quality – beautiful. The outside is stunning. The inside is unlined and a bit easy to mark.

Leather smell – intoxicating

Print – tiger-like, if you were viewing the tiger through an imaginative haze. It’s Westwood's pirate print, an ‘80s print, so it announces itself a LOT. The exception is the black-on-green colourway – that one merely whispers. And on the red version, which is exclusive to Vivienne Westwood stores, the print seems vaguely vaginal (I’m sorry, I deal with letters pertaining to the vagina very often, don’t ask why).

Englishness – it’s very English-y. Westwood’s an iconic Brit; the Cambridge Satchel Company’s name alone speaks of punting down the river Cam. It so happens I have done this – the man wielding the big punting stick (does it have a better name than this? Perhaps it does. Tell me, if so, in the comments) happened to look like the love interest in Eat, Pray, Love (by the way, haven’t seen that; have read about it).

Size – terribly adorable

Practicality – far less ideal than I’d like to admit. The aforementioned adorable size means it looks like a satchel stolen from a small child. Though I measured it out onto paper before I ordered it, when I held it in my hands it was TINY. When I tried to put my modest daily essentials in it, it didn’t quite work (it could only accommodate two out of three of the keys/wallet/phone combo at any one time). A bit more enthusiasm meant I was ultimately able to slot everything in, even my special pass to get into work. But practical it is not. I would also not quite consider it an evening bag. But if you’re wanting to walk around looking like a stylish street-style person (NOT me – stylish street-style people do not combine the carrying of a tiny bag with the lugging of a big tote), clearly this bag’s a winner.