Know me, know that if a piece of kit has five (5) rotary knobs plus level meters on it and I can slip it over my arm and out the door, it's coming with me.
D'you think I could feasibly wear these two as earrings? Or a choker and a bag, maybe? Because trust me, I’ll tote them however I can.
You can squirrel speakers into premium beds, around IKEA picture frames or even in the base of table lamps in the name of space-saving cross-functional pieces. But this? This is different. This is something I'd take out into the great wide open in the name of music.
Nick Bentel Studio has created them, a company that's the creative force behind some hugely whimsical and thought-provoking furniture, fashion and art projects.
The two electronic handbags you see here are the translucent Speaker Bag, a Bluetooth-enabled boombox in bag form, and the Mixer Bag, a fully functional audio mixer that lets you connect and mix up to four devices on the go – and it's the latter that really excites me. Bluetooth speaker bags are not unheard of (see Bang & Olufsen's odd 2022 Balenciaga collab) but a decent mixer in bag form? That's new to me.
With its see-through acrylic shell and visible circuitry, the Nick Bentel Speaker Bag is still so very kitsch though. And I do love its RGB LED level meter with three display modes (controlled via a Mode button on the side of the bag). Then again, is it just a Bluetooth speaker? Would I really put my phone in it before heading out to the club? No, because I value my phone. Maybe a chapstick; possibly a box of Tic Tacs – that's it. And also, it does cost a cool $350…
Miss Mixalot
The Mixer Bag ($400, which would make it around £290 or AU$610) meanwhile is a working control hub – a four-channel mixer with stereo/mono support built into a handbag shape, ready for spontaneous sets, parties and so on.
You get four input channels (6.35mm/3.5mm) and one output, compatible with devices such as your phone, CD players, computers and amps. Each channel has a stereo/mono switch for flexible mixing too.
Then, there's the built-in 16-bit dual-color LED meters to show levels in real-time. For me, the star of the show is still the Mixer Bag's one main volume knob, plus four independent channel knobs so you can adjust each input separately. And Nick Bentel Studio says it's powered by DC 5V – so no bulky adapter needed.
Together, the pair creates something of a portable DJ kit. Nick Bentel's people tell me that this limited-edition drop is made by hand at the Studio and will launch on July 2 with preorders starting on June 30.
The point is, that Mixer Bag's got proper audio chops and is designed to be used; it's not just a fun bag with knobs on. To me, it screams high-end and Club Kids of the late 1980s, in the way other portable speaker offerings never have.
Perhaps I can do without the Speaker Bag. But that Mixer Bag is just too good…
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