What I think about when I'm running: Fjällräven

When I go running (which isn't often), my mind is usually humming with the following thoughts: am I running on the balls of my feet as opposed to thumping down on my heels and doing my knees in while I'm at it? + am I breathing through my nose so that a) I can allow oxygen to properly massage my internal organs and b) I don't look like a dog panting on a hot day when it's only the beginning of March? + did I lock both door locks when I left the house? I live in Hackney, after all.

But today I also thought about Fjällräven, and the mixed feelings it engenders in me.

Okay, so let me back track by way of explanation. About two years ago, I started seeing funny looking satchels stamped with Fjällräven on the backs of people walking and cycling around Hackney. It was an inexplicable sartorial movement that had suddenly emerged in which its participants, I not being one of them, traded in this indecipherable codeword like a modern day version of Freemasonry. 

But it was right in my face, despite the fact that I have only just learned how to spell 'Fjällräven' so that I could Google it.

Just to be clear, I don't usually care much for the latest fashion fancies. But because Fjällräven sounds suspiciously Scandinavian (associations: progressive, simplicity, NOMA, elves), I could hardly ignore the phenomenon entirely, try as I might. 

Brings back unflattering memories

Two years on and there's no sign that the Fjällräven takeover of the streets of East London is slowing down. I'm also where I was two years ago in relation to the 'movement'. On the outside peering in. I've been held back from joining the fray by a nagging question mark over how unattractively utilitarian the brand's satchels look. Despite coming in all sorts of primary colours, the satchels are symbols of austerity. They look just like the kind of backpacks from my childhood that I didn't want because only the poor kids wore bags without furry animal prints on them. As it turns out, Fjällräven backpacks were designed in the 1970s as a solution to the back problems of children saddled with unwieldy 1950s backpacks. But it's hard enough for an adult, let alone a child, to be wholeheartedly convinced by the brilliance of function over form. In any case, looks can be deceiving; a Fjällräven satchel will set you back a cool £60-£80.

Moreover, for all their hardiness and lack of gloss, the satchels don't seem to weather all that well. From the evidence on the streets, they seem to stain and fade easily. Which is probably why they are perfectly suited to their primary market – hipsters (or should I say 'early adopters') in shabby chic East London. I include in this crowd the Fjällräven-clad young woman who sparked my thinking about the subject during my run when she overtook me on her bicycle.

Fjällräven's takeover of London's streets is both a good and a bad thing.

It's remarkable how trends come into being, especially when their lackeys are divorced from the original philosophy behind the product at the forefront of the trend. I wonder how many of Fjällräven backpack wearers know about the social significance of their purchase and unwitting brand ambassadorship? Are they even fans of trekking – the brand's original niche? Fjällräven's website confirms my long-held suspicion that the brand is another one of Scandinavia's triumphs in down-to-earth social progressiveness. It proudly advertises itself as a 50-year-old conscious enterprise doing good work for the environment and small businesses as well as taking care to look after its employees. Not least, its products, as illustrated by its signature satchel, are mostly worthy design solutions, and mostly for outdoor adventurers not urban creatures.

And yet for all its worthiness, I cannot bring myself to support the brand – at least with my money. Quite apart from the fact that I still think a Fjällräven backpack leaves much to be desired aesthetically, its near ubiquity on Hackney's streets tells me that if I were caught wearing an as-yet unstained version, whatever little credit I have in the trend stakes will be hoovered up in no time. (So I lied. I do care about fashion fancies.) So while Fjällräven may wish to raise its believers' social capital because it is associated with All That's Good on the planet, its very popularity in this corner of the planet may just undercut that wish. It seems, then, that I will have to wait until the hype has gone the way of the Macarena so that Fjällräven can go back to being an obscure hard-to-pronounce brand that people buy into for no other reason then that its products work. In other words, better Kathmandu than Herschel.

So much for what I was thinking about when I went running today.