I’m enjoying the Olympics and the lovely weather in London. It finally feels a bit like summer! It’s the perfect time to go out and do stuff: go to Olympic events, have a picnic in the park or do a photo walk along the Thames. And what does every geeky girl need for that: a bag to hold all her gadgets!

For the past week I got to try out a limited edition Knomo bag: the Olympia tote bag. It’s specially designed to celebrate the London Olympics and Team GB, featuring the red, white and blue colours. Made from a “highly durable coated canvas exterior that is water/dirt-resistant”, it’s super light and so easy to bring along with you.

Olympia Tote Bag

On the outside there’s large flat pocket that runs from the red stripe to the right end of the bag, with a smaller mobile phone sized pocket within it. It’s perfect for Oyster card and whatever gadget you need to access quickly. On the inside it’s pretty much one large zipped compartment with on one side a zipped pocket and some smaller gadget pockets. I love how Knomo designs their bags; the pockets and are always easily accesible and the right size. Rather than having the zipped pocket going down the entire length of the bag (and making you have to stick your entire arm into the bag to reach something), the pockets go about halfway down and are so handy to use.

For me it could easily hold the gadgets I normally want to bring along and usually struggle with in more petite bags: DSLR with 2 camera lenses, iPad, laptop (there isn’t a special laptop compartment, but I know there are people out there who prefer using their own sleeve and just want a bag that the laptop fits in). I wouldn’t suggest lugging all those around with you, but if you have to, rest assured that this bag can hold it all. I even tested to see if it would fit my picnic blanket and it does!

As I mentioned in a post last week, there’s still time to win one of these limited edition Olympia bags and it’s signed by Team GB Olympic Footballer Marvin Sordell! Plus you’ll also get £200/€250/$250 worth of products from the Knomo website. All you need to do is tweet a photo of your “Olympic London” to @knomo with the hashtag #MyOlympicLondon or upload the photo to their Facebook page.

I got to try out this bag before Christmas, but because of being so sick around that time, I completely forgot to write up this review. And I forgot to take photos of the bag (and me). Anyway here’s finally my review.

The Silvi is a cross body bag with a quilted design, available in black, brown, gold and black pebbled. I thought it would be perfect as a secondary bag for most of my medium gadgets, like my iPad and DSLR. It’s a bit smaller though than I imagined. I tried to put my sleeved iPad in and it just fits. Just. It’s not a bag I’d comfortably use though as “my iPad bag” (maybe it works better with other sleeves, but with my one it was a too tight fit. I do have quite a bulky sleeve though). For my DSLR though it was great! It fit nicely in the Silvi with some spare room for a second lens and whatever other gadgets you have with you.

On the outside the Silvi has two pockets (front and back) which are handy for things you easily need to reach (like your Oyster card and phone). It closes with a small magnet, so you also don’t feel as if it’s completely open and available for everyone to reach into (yes, I am a bit paranoid of pickpockets). Besides that there is a small zipped front pocket, slightly larger than a credit card (it’s a great spot to store your business cards). Inside is one main compartment with a zipped pocket on one side and a mobile phone sized pocket on the other.

The Silvi is a cute little bag and it would work great as a secondary gadget bag. It’s perfect for a DSLR and similar sized gadgets.

The Silvi is available on the Knomo website for £65.