With Its System Tote, Cuyana Reimagined the Work Bag

In 2021, when many of us were just starting to remember what a work bag looked like, Cuyana set out to reinvent the category. As return-to-office plans began to take shape and hybrid schedules blurred the definition of a commute, the brand introduced the System Tote. Five years later, the leather carryall has become one of Cuyana’s best-selling bags and a celebrity favorite, spotted on the likes of Katie Holmes and Emily Blunt. This month, the label marked the tote’s half-decade anniversary with a limited-edition collection that reimagines the silhouette in five new ways.

From the outside, the original System Tote is deliberately simple: a softly structured silhouette in double-faced Italian pebbled leather, with rounded corners and little visible hardware. Its defining feature is hidden inside. A series of discreet snaps allows its wearer to add and remove Cuyana’s organizational pieces—including laptop sleeves, cases, and pouches—as well as smaller bags, turning the tote into a modular, yes, system.

“The pandemic reshaped the way women lived and worked. We had to rethink what a work bag could be altogether,” says Shilpa Shah, who co-founded Cuyana with Karla Gallardo in 2011. Rather than designing something that belonged exclusively to the office—or, conversely, to off-duty life—the pair saw an opportunity for a bag that could move between both. A shopper could carry a laptop and the day’s essentials to work in a single tote, then shed some of that cargo for lunch or happy hour drinks, with smaller pieces designed to function on their own.