Hex Strata Medium Gym Duffle REVIEW

I’m what a lot of people would refer to as a ‘bag lady’. I like bags. I collect them like they are going out of style. Over the years, I have amassed a wide variety of styles and have just about every function covered with the bags I have in storage. So, it’s kind of rare to find a bag style that I’ve not experienced or have in my possession. HEX, a designer of premium accessories, including carrying bags and cases, actually did introduce me to a bag that I’d not used before — the Strata Medium Duffle bag.

Detail

As its name describes, the Strata Duffle is an overnight travel bag, but it packs a lot of features and storage space into its sleek, modern design. The main compartment is roomy and has plenty of room for clothes and personal items. There is a special lined pocket to hold a change of shoes that you can open from the outside of the duffle. In addition to clothing and personal items, the Strata Duffle was designed to house tech devices, too. There is a fleece-lined, padded pocket made especially for the MacBook Pro (13 and 15-inch models) and on the reverse side, there are two pockets — one is meant for tablets and the other contains an organizer for writing utensils and other accessories. As an added bonus, you can carry it as a standard duffle with a shoulder strap, or use the hidden backpack straps that are conveniently tucked away until you need them.

Some of the other features and specs on the Strata Duffle include:

• Interior cash pocket
• Side access insulated water bottle pocket
• Distressed grey crinkle polyester exterior, treated for water resistance
• Slate grey coated canvas accents
• Genuine leather zipper pulls
• Coastal coral HEX Heritage logo lining
• Overall Dimensions: 17.5″L X 12.5″W X 8.5″H
• Volume: 30L

User Experience

Even though the duffle is meant to be used as an overnight bag, which I fully intend to use it as such, I decided to give it a test drive of a different nature. Since I am used to carrying a bag with me to and from work, I thought that I would let the Strata duffle be my work bag for several days. In theory, this was a good plan. The main compartment was large enough to carry all my accessories and even my entire purse. My 13-inch MacBook Pro and 12-inch iPad Pro fit nicely inside the laptop pouch and then smaller items like my glasses and a few other personal items were stashed away into the two smaller pockets on the front. The problem I had was that everything wasn’t balanced very well. Because of this, the bag didn’t wear very well on my shoulder and as a result, I ended up straining my back. I don’t blame ANY of that on the bag because it actually held everything very well. It was my bad idea that caused the problem.

I was actually shocked at exactly how much room was in that duffle. It’s a ‘medium’ sized duffle, but it had lots of room to spare. I have a couple of weekend trips that I’m taking next month that this will be perfect for. I love that it has hidden backpack straps, but again, it’s meant to be a duffle so it’s center of balance is as a shoulder bag. The backpack straps are nice when you are in a bind and really need to carry a lot of things by hand, but I think I would stick to the should strap. I really love how easy it is to get in and out of the bag. If you need to drop something in really quickly, you can just unzip the main compartment and drop it in.

Conclusions

I really love the design of this bag. I think it’s versatile and stylish and perfect for clothing and a few extras. It’s not meant to be a business carry-all though. As a high-end duffle, you can expect to pay a bit more than the standard bag, but I feel as though $150 might be a bit on the high side. It’s a classy bag that can hold a lot of stuff. I can recommend it as a recreational, travel bag for just about anyone.

For more information, visit hexbrand.com.
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Originally published at macsources.com on April 18, 2018.