Fly me back to a time when elegance ruled
REBECCA POWERS
On my one — and only — college spring-break trip, I was still enough of a kid to be excited about being served two inflight breakfasts — one for each leg of my trip home from Fort Lauderdale, Fla. — and I happily consumed both.
Those in-air pancakes and sausages are no more. Nor, it seems, is much of the thrill of flying. At least, that’s what our travel attire and luggage often seem to say about us.
I considered that at around midnight recently in the Delta terminal at San Francisco International Airport. The red-eye was delayed, and yawning passengers were more than ready to begin their eastbound snooze.
Most of the luggage looked as uninspired and road weary as the passengers’ in-transit duds.
Travellers streamed past, seemingly sleepwalking as they guided wheeled bags like leashed pets.
Only a herringbone-patterned spinner and a red-leather trimmed navy tote stood out from the parade of sombre black.
Oh, for a set of vintage Starline luggage in mint green to enliven the scene.
Luggage has a history of stylish shlepping in a supporting role.
American Tourister ads paired Oscar-winning actress Eva Marie Saint with a set of lipstick-red bags. Audrey Hepburn travelled with classic Louis Vuitton in Charade. And in Spectre, James Bond toted Globe-Trotter, a favourite of Queen Elizabeth II.
In the 1954 Hitchcock movie Rear Window, Grace Kelly opens a sleek Mark Cross overnight case and a fluff of ivory-coloured peignoir — a confection of a negligee — emerges with a pouf. Doubly stylish. Their classic overnighters and petite train cases are still available, including the one Kelly used so effectively in her cinematic campaign to win Jimmy Stewart’s heart.
Like that little box of personal sanity, an attractive bag can lend a sense of decorum — excitement, even — to life en route.
Luggage resembling dark trash bags does little to evoke the optimism of getting away.
In the era of the jingle “See the USA in your Chevrolet,” it was popular to display travel stickers on cars’ rear passenger windows — badges as colourful as sedans once were.
Ward Dietrich, president of the 70-year-old, family-owned London Luggage Shop in midtown Detroit, remembers his parents returning from ski trips to the Swiss Alps with resort stickers festooning their luggage.
But it’s modern functionality that most excites Dietrich when he talks travel gear.
Performance is the main issue in contemporary bags, he says, with design that can withstand the rough climate of international air travel. Function before fashion.
A trend in special-edition cases indicates we may be unpacking a new attitude, with cheerful bags echoing the optimistic élan of a former era. Luggage makers are doing more and more collaborations with celebrities and designers, adding cachet to cases.
The Away brand, a relative newcomer to the luggage crowd, is known for its built-in phonecharging capability, as well as its affordability.
But in a nod to travelling in style, the brand collaborates with celebrities and artists, such as jet-setting photographer Gray Malin, whose colourful, limited-edition cases with linings depicting Malin’s aerial photos, sold out shortly after their release last October.
Similarly, Louis Vuitton collaborated with American artist Jeff Koons last spring on a line of bags for its Masters collection that featured iconic artwork — plus a nod to Koons’ own balloon rabbit. Earlier this summer, the company offered a special-edition, soccer-ball-inspired FIFA 2018 World Cup Russia bag, the Keepall Bandouliere 50.
Throwback travel pieces remain available. Several venerable companies, such as Rimowa, Louis Vuitton and Smythson of Bond Street, offer champagne carriers, dice pouches, writing folders and cases for cigarettes and pencils, evoking the days of leisurely travel in private train compartments.
Where does that all leave us in a time of ripstop-nylon backpacks and door-hook-ready hanging dopp kits? Neoclassic luggage is brains and beauty, smart and classic. Amal Clooney, for one, has been photographed toting respected, Italianmade Bric’s luggage paired with an eye-catching red-leather hatbox-style Dolce & Gabbana bag.
Are our travelling companions becoming less like Bill Gates’ chinos and more akin to Michael Avenatti’s Tom Ford suits? The baggage-claim carousel will tell.