The beginning of summer may seem like an odd time to buy a backpack – after all, they’re most often associated with school, which is just now drawing to a close – but the season calls for bags that are casual, lightweight and hands-free. Outdoor music festivals, days in the park, picnics, maybe even a light hike: all of these activities would benefit from having your man well-equipped with a great backpack, if only so that you can leave your own accessories at home and spend the day truly hands free. After years of letting your husband or boyfriend put his wallet and phone in your purse, you deserve a bit of a respite too.

Thus, we present you with a selection of backpacks, starting at $35, that will serve you well even if your school days are long gone. And as always, the best thing about Man Bag Monday is that the pieces can very easily be enjoyed by women as well, so ladies, start planning your outdoor accessories accordingly. It’s only going to get more beautiful outside from here. → Read More

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Last week, we rounded up the best accessory gifts for all the recent college grads in your life. In the comments, one of you asked us to make some suggestions for high school grads, and because we like to consider ourselves a full-service blogging operation here, we felt compelled to oblige. Almost any huge life change – graduation, moving to a new city, having a baby – impacts the way a woman interacts with the things that she carries every day, and I like to think that the best way to ready someone for a change like that is to get her the sartorial equipment she needs in order to settle in to her new life.

Thus, we present you with our picks for the best high school grad gifts. Leaving home for the first time is nerve-racking enough, but there are some things you can do to make sure your grad is prepared to take on college and hit the ground running. Not to mention, if you get her a nice overnight bag, maybe she’ll come home more often. (That’s a pretty good theory, I think. Write that one down.) Best of all, all of our picks are under $600. → Read More

Not long ago, I said that my feelings toward Thursday Friday’s line of bag-on-bag printed totes had “softened.” At that point, Balenciaga was the latest designer to have a photo of their work plastered on a canvas tote bag and sold for up to $90 apiece, and like Hermes and Chanel before it, Balenciaga is a huge brand with a huge corporate structure behind it to protect its work product. They can stand up for themselves, and although the Thursday Friday bags are certainly not my personal cup of tea, the combination of the chosen subject matter and the totes’ ubiquity had made me a little less opinionated about the whole thing.

Well. Guess what. This time, Thursday Friday has chosen to go after Proenza Schouler, a small New York brand that’s still in its relative infancy and that has yet to so much as open a brick-and-mortar store for itself. Compared to the Chanels of the world, Proenza Schouler is utterly tiny and a labor of love by the brand’s founders, Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez. The success of the PS1 and the brand’s other accessories allow it to do some of the most beautiful and innovative textile work in modern fashion; clothes like that don’t often turn a profit because of the enormous expense associated with producing such technically complicated work in small quantities, so for Proenza Schouler and brands like it, handbags are a crucial part of the business model. But hey, who cares about all that? Let’s take someone else’s hard work, slap it on a tote bag and make some cash! → Read More

Generally I love anything that Balenciaga does with its much-loved Balenciaga Motorcycle Bags. I love them in regular leather, patent, prints, raffia…you get the idea, I’m a fan, and so is the rest of the PurseBlog team. In fact, the only trepidation I can remember expressing over Balenciaga’s bags in the past concerned the brand’s first foray into perforated leather, and I don’t think I like the Balenciaga Polka Dot Bags any more.

This design features perhaps the biggest perforations I’ve ever seen on a handbag, and I can’t help but wonder how that will play into the bag’s longterm wear. Cutting that many holes of that size into a piece of leather significantly changes how the material distributes stress and weight, which will likely lead to a shorter lifespan for the bag. Of course, if you’re buying a look this bold, you probably don’t want to wear it forever; a single season might do just fine. And now that I think of it, if you’re looking for a bag in which to carry your extremely tiny dog, these might be nice, breathable options. Check out more pictures of the bags after the jump and then let us know what you think in the comments. → Read More

On the eve of the much-anticipated Facebook IPO, everyone is buzzing about the pioneering social network and its role in our daily lives. Many people stand to become extremely wealthy once shares hit the market, especially Mark Zuckerberg, who is a mere 28 years old. I’m part of the Facebook generation, and I login daily to connect and see what my friends are doing. Make sure you are connecting with us, we have some great giveaways coming up!

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If you’re a regular BagThatStyle reader (or a Brit), you’re probably long familiar with these two ladies, but if you’ll allow us to indulge ourselves a bit, I’d appreciate it. I’ve become slightly fascinated with Petra Ecclestone Stunt, the 23-year-old handbag designer (really, she is) and new owner of the famous Spelling Mansion, and her 27-year-old sister Tamara Ecclestone, whose resumé seems to include going on lots of fabulous vacations with her boyfriend and wearing every dress Herve Leger has every made. The most important thing that you need to know about these two women, though, is that their handbag collections are absolutely sick.

The Ecclestones are relatively unknown on this side of the Atlantic, but these heiresses have quite the pedigree, not to mention the bank accounts to back it up in a way that Paris Hilton never could. Their father, Bernie Ecclestone, is CEO of Formula One racing and has a net worth estimated at $4.2 billion. Their mother, Bernie’s ex-wife Slavica, is a former model known mostly for her work with Armani (and for being a full foot taller than Bernie) and whose 2009 divorce settlement reportedly made her a billionaire as well. These girls have money to burn, and it looks like they’ve chosen to burn a significant amount of it on handbags, particularly those from Hermes. Petra even loves bags so much that she’s designing her own line of ulta-luxe clutches, which you can check out, along with some of the most lust-worthy bags in both their closets, after the jump. → Read More

When a handbag becomes a hit, you can always bet that you’ll see its details morphed into new shapes without much delay. Not only does it make sense to capitalize on the original design’s popularity, but remaking a tote as a shoulder bag or a satchel as a crossbody is a great way to capture the interest of additional customers who like the original but don’t see it as relevant to their structural preferences. Thus, we present the Yves Saint Laurent ChYc Shoulder Bag, born out of the success of the original Cabas ChYc. → Read More