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Questions about this piece
What size tote do you need to fit a laptop?
Go by width first. A 13-inch laptop is about 12 inches across, a 14-inch about 12.5, and a 15-inch closer to 13.5, so you want a bag with at least an inch more width than that and enough height to clear the screen. This one is 15 inches wide and 10.5 high, which takes a 13- or 14-inch laptop lying flat with room beside it for a charger. It is a slouchy bag rather than a padded sleeve, so slide the laptop into a sleeve first.
How do you keep a slouchy bag from looking messy?
Give it a shape to hold and a reason not to sag in the middle. A slouchy bag collapses around whatever is inside, so the trick is loading it evenly and standing the heavy, rigid thing, a book or a water bottle, upright against one side rather than lying it across the bottom. Closing it helps too, since an open mouth is what reads as unmade. This one shuts with a magnetic snap, and the two top handles pull the opening together as you lift it.
What is the inside of this bag like?
Printed with florals, which is more useful than it sounds: dark keys and a black wallet show up against a pattern instead of vanishing into a black lining. There is a zip pocket and open pockets in there for the things you want kept apart, and a phone pocket on the outside back, so your phone rides flat against your side and you are not digging past everything else to answer it.





