On May 6th, I walked into a Tumi location to check out a bag I’d been heavily eyeing online: the Annapolis Crossbody Zip Flap bag.
I knew immediately that I adored it. I knew just as certainly that I didn’t need it. At that point, I’d been using Fossil’s Field City Bag for 3 months, and I was pretty satisfied with it. After checking out the bag, I turned around and walked out, determined to wait.
I drove back a few hours later and walked out with it. (Some wait, huh?) I’m really glad I did, and after 2.5 months of testing, I’ve been satisfied with what I’ve found. Tumi’s Annapolis Zip Flap bag is easily one of the 3-5 best bags I’ve ever had, if not the best.
The Annapolis stands 12.5 inches tall, is 11.5 inches wide, and weighs 1.8 lbs. The bag is expandable via zipper from 2.5 inches deep to 5 inches deep. In 2.5 months, I’ve only expanded the bag once. This bag is part of Tumi’s Alpha Bravo line, and I love the look of it. It can easily be carried by anyone, and it never looks out of place. The last few months of my life have been abnormally busy, and the bag has served in several roles: daily purse/get home bag (I affectionately refer to my daily drivers as zombie bags), car bag, vacation bag, conference room/meeting bag, lots of exploring and adventures. There’s no better way to test your gear than actually using it, and the Annapolis performed well in my testing.
The main body of the Annapolis comes in either ballistic nylon (one of my very favorite fabrics) that comes in Hickory (black) or Navy (Navy blue), polyester that comes in Anthracite (light grey), or a version in chocolate-colored leather. All versions are reinforced at the bottom with dark brown leather with a panel that Tumi will monogram for free. It also came with a leather luggage tag that I immediately discarded. I chose the ballistic nylon Hickory model, and the fabric is good quality. It has enough structural integrity to hold its shape most of the time, but is both soft and closely knit. In my experience, bags that are closely woven tend to last longer and look better. I haven’t spent a lot of time in the rain with this bag, but I have put several things that needed to be kept dry inside the bag before stepping into the rain, and once reaching my destination, they were dry.
There are 3 external zippers with metal zipper pulls. The zippers pulls are audible while walking, but most of the time they move well when pulled. When at off angles, movement can be less smooth.
The front of the bag is a large flap secured to the bottom front of the bag by a rubber metal enclosure of adjustable length. The closure is secure, and you’ll likely use all 3 size adjustment lengths. There are few downsides of this bag for me, and this is a relatively small one: the rubber catches lint and other fabric, so you’ll sometimes need to brush it off. Located on the exterior of that flap is a zippered pocket with a soft lining. I believe it is intended to be a sunglasses pocket, but it’s the pocket I use the most because it is perfectly placed, so I usually carry my wallet, Bluetooth earpiece, eyeglass cleaning cloth, etc there. An iPhone 6s wearing a Magpul case disappears inside the pocket, often with no trace.
Between this flap and the front of the bag is my absolute favorite feature, one I don’t see mentioned as often as I thought I would because it is so stealthy I think it eluded many reviewers. There’s a totally ninja and totally awesome slip pocket between the top of the flap and the front of the bag!!!
Y’all, this is the single best execution of a phone pocket that I have ever seen on any bag ever. I estimate it to be at least 3 inches wide, and it runs from the top of the flap nearly to the bottom of the bag. How much you can fit in that pocket depends on how full the rest of the bag is, but my most common use of the pocket is as a phone pocket. The aforementioned iPhone 6s is usually swallowed without even a burp, and the top of the pocket is secured with magnetic closures. I’ve used it many times to quickly stow my umbrella, to hold a water bottle, a place to cram Rice Krispie treats, a reusable bag, can of Coke, you name it.
I’d like to pause here to reinforce how well this bag is constructed. The Annapolis is not inexpensive, and its materials and their construction are the reason why. Throughout the bag, the materials are of fine quality. Though the bag is remarkably versatile, it is designed to be slim. It feels like a well tailored suit, and the admirable thing is that Tumi’s designed it to cut a trim, refined profile while carrying a normal load, but they’ve also constructed it so that while carrying medium to heavy loads, it looks almost exactly the same, but with a graceful swell. It’s the sort of bag that fits nearly any situation, and does so in both function and form.
Under the flap, the front of the bag has 2 separate pockets, the largest of which is closest to the main compartment. In that pocket, the left pocket runs about 40% the length of the bag, the middle is a pen pocket where I keep my beloved Zebra F-301 Compact, a gift from my dear friend Stephanie. The right has 2 chapstick-sized pockets. Except for the pen area, I don’t use this pocket at all. The external pocket closest to the front of the bag has a zipped pocket that has a card directing buyers to Tumi’s website as well as a card detailing Tumi’s ID Lock feature. Tumi has placed on this pocket what they call a Tumi Tracer, a barcode with personal information you can provide if you wish, that they can use to locate you if the bag is ever found and brought to a Tumi location. I don’t use this pocket at all. I don’t load much into the front pockets of my bags, so that they appear more trim.
On my bag, the stitching on the trim of the outside of this pocket, the portion that often comes in contact with the inside of the flap, is showing slight wear after 2.5 months of use. The fabric is so closely knit that it doesn’t detract from the function of the bag, which is a good call on Tumi’s part. Coarse fabric tends to begin fraying faster and easier, but that isn’t a problem here.
The main compartment is accessible via zipper. There are 2 internal pockets- an open one toward the front of the bag that I usually keep my beloved earplugs in, and a zippered one toward the back of the bag that makes for good document storage. I wouldn’t overfill the front internal pocket. If overfilled, it impedes the performance of that wonderful slip pocket on the front of the bag.
Even unexpanded, the bag holds a lot if you want it to, and does so fairly comfortably. The inside of the bag is reflective and colored light silver, making it a bit easier to find items.
I tend to carry a decent amount of items- first aid kit, mini survival kit, umbrella, pocket organizer for smaller items, phone cord, meds, wet wipes, etc, and when organized well, it’s a medium load for the bag. Things can sometimes get a bit crowded, though it helps that while on vacation recently, I picked up a smaller First Aid pouch in an Army/Navy store to carry a streamlined and simplified version of my first aid kit. The bag tends to be a little bit taller than most of the items I carry, so there is often a bit of open space toward the top. This is a great place to carry small or delicate items, small breakable items wrapped in protective paper, things like that.
Like every other bag, the fewer things you carry, the easier it is to find what you need. Unlike some other bags, it isn’t automatically out of commission if you have to toss things into it on the fly or root around to grab something without immediately putting everything back in its place. Some bags, that’s a 4 alarm fire.
Moving around to the back of the bag, there’s an open pocket that runs the length of the bag. This is a great place to put documents you’re gonna’ need in a minute, stuff receipts, iPad Minis/Kindles (my iPad Mini disappears completely), and even possibly a book. The one time I expanded the bag was to cram a book in this pocket, and it fit, albeit tightly given that the bag was already pretty full.
The Annapolis has a wonderful strap. Like the ballistic nylon the rest of my bag is constructed of, the strap is also high quality and is tightly knit. The material feels like a seatbelt. The connectors that connect the strap to the bag are solid, but slim. I like them, but I would prefer buckles that you could quickly detach the strap from the bag with. My 2nd favorite way to use this bag is as a car bag. If I’m going to be on the road for awhile, I loop the strap of the bag around the back of my passenger seat and open the bag, giving easy access to items while ensuring it remains in place, and that your bag won’t end up in the floorboard if you need to brake. If using Google Maps, I’ll plug the phone into my external charger, then shove it in the front slip pocket so it is immediately accessible if need be, but out of the way and out of sight. Detachable buckles would make removing the bag from the seat much faster and easier.
If I could pick one thing to change about this bag, it would be to add a handle! In my opinion, it is somewhat difficult to do that in many cases without negatively affecting the bag’s aesthetics, but every single time I remove this bag, I immediately grab the top middle of the bag, and instead of a handle, I end up pinching the fabric at the top middle of the bag. Every time, it pisses me off. There really, really should be a handle there. If you combined a handle that concealed in a pocket when not in use with a detachable strap that could be stored when not in use, it would give owners more flexibility in how to use this bag. To me, it feels like a miss that it wasn’t designed that way, especially given the price.
At $275 for the Hickory in ballistic nylon, it certainly isn’t cheap; I bought it as part of my birthday gift to myself. Whether or not it’s worth it is subjective, and depends on what you want from your bags. To me, as a special occasion splurge, it’s absolutely worth it. The Annapolis is well constructed, and comes with good quality, durable materials and hardware. Barring disaster, I expect it will last for a very long time. All of those things come at a cost, though. If durability isn’t so important to you, this bag might not be your first choice. I would love to see the price at least $50 less, but not at the expense of the material quality. Using subpar materials would ruin the upscale look and feel of the bag.
I rate Tumi’s Annapolis Zip Flap bag a solid A. If the price came down at least $50, or the bag was redesigned to include a handle and/or a detachable strap while remaining at this price or lower, it would become an A+.