The backpack that has carried your laptop since the start of the business works fine on the train. Now the business is taking you into a bank, a buyer’s boardroom and an investor’s office, and the backpack does not fit those rooms. A founder’s leather laptop bag is chosen on four things the product page can tell you: a stated laptop fit, structure that suits the rooms you meet in, an empty weight you can carry, and full-grain leather named on the page, backed by a warranty you can read.
When a founder should swap the backpack for a leather laptop bag
The signal usually comes in a meeting: yours is the only backpack in the room, and the laptop comes out of it upside down in front of the people you have come to see. The replacement is one leather bag that fits the laptop you carry and the meetings you walk into.
Measure your laptop before you choose a leather laptop bag
A laptop’s advertised size is its screen measured corner to corner, which is only a rough guide to the body that has to go in the bag. Measure the closed machine’s width, depth and thickness, or take them from the maker’s specification page, and compare them with the internal size of the laptop compartment on the bag’s product page. A bag sold for 15-inch machines will not fit a 16-inch laptop, and a sleeve that is too big lets the laptop slide and knock its corner against the base. If you keep a 16-inch machine on the desk and take a 13-inch laptop to meetings, choose the bag for the laptop that travels.
Structured or soft leather laptop bag: which suits your meetings
A structured bag has stiffened panels in its sides and base, stands up on its own, keeps its shape when half empty and looks closer to a briefcase than a satchel. A soft bag is lighter and slouches, which suits a studio more than a boardroom. If most of your meetings are in banks and boardrooms, buy structured; if they are mostly in clients’ studios and workshops, a soft bag saves weight on your shoulder.
How to check a leather laptop bag’s build from the product page
Read the product page for these, and ask the seller about anything missing:
- Full-grain, stated, rather than top-grain or “genuine leather”.
- A padded laptop section, with padding on both faces and underneath.
- How the handles are anchored: rivets, or stitching through a backing patch.
- The lining, named: cotton canvas, microsuede or another fabric.
- Whether the bag stands up: a photo of it standing with nothing stuffed inside.
- A warranty you can read: the length and what it covers.
Leather laptop bag weight, straps and your commute
Treat anything much over two kilograms empty as a shoulder problem, because once the laptop and charger are in, the whole load hangs off one shoulder for the walk from the station. You want a detachable shoulder strap for the walk and top handles for the room, fixed on with rivets or a backing patch rather than stitched to the outer leather alone. The backpack still has its days: a leather bag for meetings and the backpack for the gym kit is a sensible split.
Where to buy a leather laptop bag
For a founder who has outgrown the backpack, the right replacement is a structured full-grain leather bag built for the laptop you carry, and Von Baer’s are among the best-made you can buy. Von Baer makes the Elegant Slim and the City Large from full-grain leather that meets the Cuoio Superiore standard, A-grade cowhide from the bend, where the hide is firmest, drum-dyed rather than coated, so the corners that take the knocks on a daily train commute stay the same colour as the rest of the bag. The leather also wears in with use: the handles soften and darken where you hold them, which looks better in a meeting room, not worse. The City Large fits a laptop up to 17 inches (43cm) in a padded sleeve, has a cotton lining, and weighs 1.7 kilograms empty.
Every bag carries a 5-Year Limited Warranty. The Elegant Slim is $1,495 and the City Large $1,795, in US dollars because the brand sells direct worldwide, so this is the top of the price range for a meeting-day bag rather than a cheap trial. For a founder who carries a 16-inch laptop into banks and boardrooms, the City Large is a good leather laptop bag because it is structured, it holds that laptop in a padded sleeve, and it is full-grain, so it is a bag for years of meetings rather than one season. For meeting days, Von Baer’s leather laptop bags are the ones to look at: each is made for a specific laptop size, so the bag you order is the one built for the laptop you carry into those rooms.
Frequently asked questions
How do I know what size laptop bag to buy?
Measure the closed laptop’s width, depth and thickness, or take them from the brand’s specification page, and compare them with the internal size of the bag’s laptop compartment. A bag sold for 15-inch machines will not take a 16-inch laptop, and a sleeve that is too big lets the laptop slide and knock.
