The ‘big-ass bag’ – do you really need a tote you can carry a small human in?

Name: Big-Ass Bags.

Age: The titular “Big-Ass Bag” launched this month (but large carrying receptacles have been available for centuries).

Appearance: Big ass.

Hey, who are you calling big ass? An absurdly capacious Luluemon tote.

How big is it really? Oh, it’s enormous-ass: 80 litres.

I don’t understand why bags are measured in litres – what am I going to do, fill it with milk? People on TikTok are managing to fill it with themselves.

Balenciaga’s £975 shopping bag. Photograph: Matches Fashion

OK, that is pretty big-ass. People are loving mocking its ludicrous dimensions online: “I know a studio apartment when I see one,” an Instagram commenter said. Product reviews include: “I took it with me to my summer backpacking trip. I was able to bring back the Eiffel Tower, coliseum [sic] and many other monuments.” Others have joked that it “runs small”: “I can only fit two of my five kids in this bag,” someone complained.

Does it have any genuine fans? Refinery 29 claims it’s a “brilliant solution for lugging everything at once”.

Are other big-ass bags available? Yes, they’re extremely on trend. There’s Loewe’s Puzzle Fold XL, The Row’s Marlo 14, or the cavernous Chanel beach bag Dua Lipa was recently seen carrying. That’s the one Women’s Wear Daily said back in April signalled “a return to dramatically oversized bags”.

Dramatically oversized is right. Bet it’s dramatically pricey too. The Chanel one will cost about £6,000 ($8,000).

That’s the price of a car! But what price a bag you could actually put a car into? Lululemon’s bag is a more reasonable £228.

Alternatively, I could plump for one of those zip-up plastic laundry bags – six for a tenner at Tesco. Also très chic! Balenciaga did a high-fashion version in 2016 (for £975).

Wasn’t “high fashion” trying to get us excited about absurdly tiny handbags five minutes ago? It needs to make its mind up. Yes, nano-bags have had their moments – you might recall seeing Lizzo carrying a Valentino one big enough for a single piece of chewing gum at the American Music Awards in 2019. And now you mention it, US Vogue actually said in April we “need a Teeny-Tiny Tote this Summer”.

The other extreme … Lizzo with a nano-bag at the American Music Awards in 2019. Photograph: Christopher Polk/Variety/Rex/Shutterstock

What? Fashion can’t have it both ways! Argh, I’m ditching bags altogether. Sorry, I can’t let you do that – abandoning handbags and holding all your stuff in a claw grip was briefly a thing last year, but that’s ancient history.

Do say: “I like big bags and I cannot lie.”

Don’t say: “That was no solar eclipse, it was a Lululemon Big-Ass Bag.”