Vintage Luggage

Similar to vintage furniture, antique luggage has a timeless appeal that oozes individuality, classiness and style. Although despite possessing a charismatic aesthetic appeal that only vintage items achieve, there are some downsides to older and more rustic items of luggage.

If you are deliberating about whether or not to exchange the suitcase that has been in your family for generations with a contemporary substitute, then take a look at some of the advantages and disadvantages to vintage luggage.

Sentimental value

One of the main reasons we may be reluctant to exchange the suitcase we've had for decades with a new one is because of sentimental reasons. Bags that have been inherited and been passed down a family for generations have a nostalgic value that is simply irreplaceable.


That said if your vintage suitcase is hinging on the unusable you may want to consider demoting it to a more stationary use, such as storage for bed linen or children's toys. Thus, meaning that you don't have to kiss an eternal goodbye to your beloved antique suitcase.  

An individual style

You can almost guarantee that your case from the 1960s will look significantly dissimilar to all those uninteresting, mass-produced bags that are churned out down the conveyor belt at the airport. One distinct advantage of antique luggage is that due to its uniqueness, you can be sure that no-one will accidently mistake it for their own modern yet grossly replicated suitcase.

Vintage luggage, similar to other forms of vintage fashion, exudes an individuality and independent style that is regularly lost with contemporary items of fashion. If you enjoy standing out from the crowd and adhering to your own individual style, then it may well be within your interest to refrain from exchanging your antique cases for new ones.

More prone to damage

Being considerably older than its modern counterparts, it is fairly safe to assume that if your vintage luggage has had its fair share of use and will be showing some signs of wear and tear. Not only may your beloved vintage case be showing signs of the ravages of time but it is likely to be more prone to further damage.

Due to the brittleness of the material, it is likely that vintage luggage will be on borrowed time and replacing it with newer items is imminent.

Heavier than modern alternatives

Modern luggage is typically designed and manufactured with considerably lighter materials than suitcases and bags that were produced a couple of decades ago. Using less weighty and softer materials compared to the clumpy cases of old, exchanging your vintage luggage for newer models could easily mean that you gain a couple of kilos in weight.

Guest blogger Carla Williams wrote this blog about luggage for www.londonluggage.co.uk.