As screen fatigue grows, a new trend is swapping smartphones for crosswords and sketchbooks – turning the humble bag into a tool for offline living
There’s a new “it” bag – but this time it is not about a designer label or splashy logo. Instead, it’s what is inside that counts.
So-called analogue bags, filled with activities such as crosswords, knitting, novels and journals, have become the unexpected accessory of the season.
They are being championed by millennials and gen Z as a way to reduce screen time. Similar to a prep bag, the idea is that the bag or basket should contain the essentials needed to remain offline for as long as possible. One user describes it as a “toy box for your attention span”.
David Sax, the author of The Revenge of Analog, approves of the trend. “The idea that we can all just get into a lotus pose and fall into a state of meditative bliss is wildly unrealistic for the vast majority of us,” he says. “Our phones have everything you could ever ask for, so you need an alternative to hand in order to fill that void.”
