Leudes Crochet Bag Review: Six Months of Carrying Projects Everywhere

I have a confession that will not surprise anyone who has ever met me at a yarn shop table: I am a project carrier. For thirty years I have crocheted, and for most of those years I hauled my current work-in-progress around in whatever plastic bag was handy. A grocery bag. A tote that had once held a beach towel. A reusable shopping bag with a hole in the bottom that I kept meaning to patch. Then, six months ago, I finally bought the Leudes crochet bag backpack, and I have used it almost every single day since.

This is not a sponsored review and I did not get the bag for free. I bought it with my own money, I have carried it to my kitchen table, to my living room recliner, to my church's donation drive meetings, and on a long weekend trip to my sister's house. Here is what six months of daily use taught me.

How I've Used It

I am a retired middle school math teacher in Worcester, Massachusetts, and I have crocheted for about 30 years. My aunt taught me when I was in my twenties, and I have been making blankets, dishcloths, hats, and baby gifts for my church's donation drive ever since. My usual setup is a recliner in my living room with a floor lamp, plus my kitchen table for blocking. The Leudes bag has become the thing that carries my projects between those two spots and out into the world.

In six months I have used the Leudes bag for a queen-size blanket in progress, three hats, two dishcloth sets, and a baby blanket. I have also used it as a regular backpack when I needed to bring a book, a water bottle, and a small project to a doctor's appointment. The bag has held up through all of it. The zippers still glide, the straps have not frayed, and the stitching on the handles has not pulled.

The thing that surprised me most is how much the bag holds. I can fit a full blanket project with two skeins of yarn, a hook case, a small pair of scissors, and a notebook in the main compartment, and still have room for a water bottle in the side pocket. For a person who used to carry projects in a grocery bag, that is a revelation.

Let me give you a concrete example from last January. I was working on a queen-size blanket for my niece's wedding, and I needed to bring it to my sister's house for a long weekend so I could keep making progress. I packed the blanket, three skeins of the main color, a partial skein of the border color, my hook case with six hooks, a pair of small scissors, a tape measure, and a row counter. Everything went into the Leudes bag, and I still had room to tuck a paperback into the front pocket. That was the moment I stopped missing my old tote.

What the Leudes Bag Does Well

The Leudes crochet bag is built like a backpack, which means the weight sits on both shoulders instead of pulling on one wrist or one shoulder. That matters to me because I have mild stiffness in my right thumb joint in cold weather, and carrying a heavy tote by its handles makes it worse. With the Leudes bag, I can load up a full project and walk to the kitchen table without any strain.

The pockets are the other big win. There is a main compartment that opens wide, plus front pockets, side pockets, and small interior pockets for hooks and stitch markers. I keep my hook case in one interior pocket, my scissors in another, and my stitch markers in a tiny zippered pouch. Everything has a place, and I do not have to dig through a tangle of yarn to find a hook.

The fabric is also worth mentioning. It is a sturdy woven material that has held up to six months of daily use, including being tossed into the back of my husband Glenn's car and being set down on the floor of a church hall. It wipes clean easily, which I appreciate because I am not a careful person with my craft supplies.

One small detail I have come to appreciate is the way the main zipper pulls. It is a long, sturdy pull that is easy to grab even when my hands are cold and my right thumb is acting up. On a bag I open several times a day, that matters more than I expected. I have owned totes with tiny zipper pulls that I had to fiddle with for ten seconds every time, and after a month of that I stopped using them. The Leudes bag has never given me that problem.

How It Handles Yarn Tangles

The main reason I bought the Leudes bag was to stop my yarn from tangling. I have lost count of how many times I pulled a half-finished project out of a grocery bag and found the yarn in a knot that took twenty minutes to untangle. The Leudes bag has a wide opening and a smooth interior, so the yarn ball sits in the bottom and rolls around without catching on anything.

I have also used the bag to carry a project that was already on a hook. I can tuck the hook into the interior pocket, lay the project on top of the yarn, and zip it closed. When I open the bag later, the project is exactly where I left it. No tangles, no snags, no lost stitches.

One note: if you are carrying multiple skeins of the same color, you should still wind them into separate balls or use yarn keepers. The bag keeps the yarn from tangling, but it does not keep two loose skeins from rolling into each other. That is a small thing, but it is worth knowing.

Here is a test I ran in March, because I am a math teacher and I like to quantify things. I put a center-pull skein in the bottom of the bag, ran the working yarn out through the top, and crocheted directly from the bag while the bag sat on the floor next to my recliner. I worked about forty rows of a dishcloth that way, and the yarn never once snagged or flipped the ball out of the bag. The wide opening and smooth interior do exactly what they are supposed to do.

I have carried this bag to my kitchen table, my recliner, and a long weekend at my sister's house, and my yarn has not tangled once.

Comfort and Everyday Carry

The Leudes bag is comfortable to carry for short trips. The shoulder straps are padded enough that a full bag does not dig into my shoulders, and the back panel is soft. I have walked about ten minutes to a friend's house with a full project in the bag and did not feel the need to switch shoulders.

For longer carries, like a full day out, I would want a little more padding in the straps. The bag is fine for a trip to the yarn shop or a meeting, but if you are planning to hike with a full crochet project, you might want a bag with thicker straps. That is a minor complaint, but it is an honest one.

The bag also works well as a regular backpack. I have used it to carry a book, a water bottle, and a small project to a doctor's appointment, and it did the job without looking out of place. The design is simple and neutral, so it does not scream 'craft bag' if you want to use it for something else.

In April I took the Leudes bag to a two-day craft retreat at a church camp about an hour from Worcester. I packed it as a carry-on for the car ride, with a hat project, two skeins, my hook case, a water bottle, and a change of socks. I carried it from the parking lot to the dormitory, then back and forth to the dining hall twice a day. The straps stayed comfortable for those short walks, and the bag sat upright against the foot of my bed without falling over. It was the first retreat where I never once wished I had brought a different bag.

What struck me at that retreat was how many other women asked about the bag. I counted six over the two days. Most of them were carrying their projects in tote bags or plastic grocery sacks, which is how I carried mine for years, and every one of them had a story about a skein rolling under a chair or a hook poking through the side. I let a few of them try the straps on, and the first thing every one of them said was that it felt lighter than it looked, because the weight sits on your back instead of hanging from one shoulder.

What Could Be Better

No review is honest without a few complaints, and the Leudes bag has three. First, the straps are not as padded as I would like for a full day of carrying. Second, the interior pockets are not zippered, so small items like stitch markers can slide out if you turn the bag upside down. Third, the bag does not stand up on its own when it is empty, which means it flops over if you set it down without leaning it against something.

None of these are dealbreakers. I have used the bag almost every day for six months, and I would buy it again. But I want to be clear that it is not a perfect bag, and you should not expect it to be one.

The floppy-empty problem is the one that gets me most often. When the bag is empty and I set it on the kitchen counter, it folds over like a sack. I have learned to lean it against the bread box or hang it by its strap, and then it is fine. But if you are the kind of person who likes a bag that stands at attention, this one will test your patience.

Who This Is For

The Leudes crochet bag is for anyone who carries a project with them. If you crochet at home and never leave the house with your yarn, you might not need it. But if you take your work to a friend's house, a waiting room, a church meeting, or a vacation, this bag will make your life easier. It is also a good choice for people who have wrist or shoulder pain from carrying heavy totes, because the backpack style spreads the weight.

I would also point a newer crocheter toward this bag. When I was learning, I carried a single hook and one skein in a sandwich bag, and I lost more hooks than I care to admit. A bag with dedicated pockets teaches you to put things back in the same place, which sounds like a small thing until you have spent ten minutes hunting for a 5.5 mm hook under a couch cushion.

Who Should Skip It

If you only crochet in one spot and never move your project, you do not need a project bag at all. If you carry very small projects, like a single hat or a dishcloth, the Leudes bag might feel like more bag than you need. And if you want a bag that stands up on its own when empty, you will be annoyed by this one. For everyone else, the Leudes crochet bag is a solid, honest choice.