V1 was made of curtains. I've said that before and I'll keep saying it, because it's the honest starting point. The first version of this bag was sewn from upholstery fabric I had lying around, just to see if the idea held up in three dimensions. It did. But it was a mockup, not a bag.
V2 is a bag.
This is the first version made from real materials, built to actually ride. And after weeks of patterning, cutting, re-cutting, and a lot of swearing at my sewing machine, it exists. Mounted on the bike, worn on my back, and out on the road.
Here's what it is.
The whole point: it converts
The reason NEUTRAL exists is one problem nobody had solved to my liking — no bag is comfortable on the bike and looks right off it. You either ride with a backpack digging into your shoulders, or you strap on a tail bag and then carry an awkward lump around once you're off the bike.
I've tried every way of tying my backpack onto the bike, and shredded quite a few straps over the years doing it. It's also cumbersome. Unravel the straps, feed them through the backpack, tighten, secure everything down, then do it all again in reverse when you arrive. That frustration is where this idea was born.
V2 does both jobs. On the bike, it mounts to the seat as a tail bag. Weight off your body, secured down, where luggage belongs at speed.
Off the bike, it's a backpack. No separate bag, no compromise, no lump. You pull it off the seat, put it on your back, and walk into wherever you're going looking like a person, not a courier.
That conversion is the entire concept, and seeing it work in real materials — not curtains, not a render — is the first time this has felt like a product instead of an idea.
What it's made of
V2 is built from proper technical materials this time. It's structured, it's water-resistant, and it holds its shape whether it's full or half-empty. I'm still dialing in the final fabric but the bones are here: a real clamshell opening, a laptop compartment, and a mounting system that holds it steady on the seat.
It's not the prettiest thing I'll ever make. Some of the seams tell you someone who learned to sew this year made it. But it's functional, it's been ridden, and every flaw in it is information for the next one.
I've actually ridden it
This isn't a studio prop. V2 has been on the bike and on a trip. I've mounted it, ridden with it, pulled it off, worn it, and used it like I'd use the finished thing. That matters, because you don't find out what's wrong with a bag by photographing it. You find out by living with it.
And I did find things wrong with it. The volume isn't quite enough. The straps need rethinking. The fabric isn't final. There's more, and I'm writing all of it up in the next post, because on this build the problems are the most useful thing I can show you.
You get a say
Here's the part that makes this list worth being on. Some of the calls about what v2 becomes aren't mine alone to make. They're yours.
I'm putting the decisions that should belong to riders up for a vote, and the first one is live right now: how big should this bag be? 18L, 22L, or 26L. Whatever wins is the size I start cutting in August.
Voting closes July 31. V2 works, and it proves the concept is real. Now the job is making it good, with you helping call the shots.
— Chin L.
Founder, NEUTRAL
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