One day last week I was tooling around the Internet and I ran across Fashionista. Now I live in a coastal beach town and so especially during the dog days of summer, fashion is the last thing on my mind. We’re so far removed from the fashion world that the main attire is bathing suits, cover-ups and flip flops.

However, they have this one feature they call Streetwalker. The editors go out daily usually on their way to lunch, or while sitting on their stoop eating ice cream in Soho, New York, and catch up with “everyday” girls walking down the street. They take pictures of outfits they like, with a little bio of the streetwalker and the reason why they think the outfit works. Because Fashionista is based in the Soho fashion district, it’s not surprising that most of the girls they stop are stylists or young women hoping to break into the fashion industry by working for design houses.

One such woman they stopped owns a small design studio for Baggu Bags. You can see in the photo that she actually has a purple Baggu on her shoulder.

Intriqued (and curiousity might just one day kill me) I looked up the Baggu Company.

Baggu is the brainchild of mother and daughter, Joan and Emily. Both were concerned with the large amount of plastic bags they were constantly bringing home from the store every time they shopped. Knowing that plastic can sit in a landfill for 500+ years, they decided to do something about it.

Both had different shopping needs. Emily lives in the city and many times shops on foot. So she needed a durable, sturdy bag that she could easily fold up and carry in her purse. Joan lives in suburbia and buys her groceries in bulk. So she needed bags that she could easily line up in the back of her vehicle.

The bags are made of ripstop nylon and come with a one-year limited warranty against defects in material & workmanship. They come in a wide (and I mean wide) variety of colors and if you like, you can even screen print on them.

Baggus hold the contents of between 2 and 3 plastic bags, and are sold in packs of one ($8,) three ($22,) or six ($38.) They each come in their own pouch, or for $5 you can order a mini-bag that holds up to 10 Baggus. They are machine washable, line dry.

Best of all, at the end of the year, you can recycle them with the company. Just return your Baggus and the company gives you $1 a bag credit off of your next Baggu order.

Not only are the bags great for grocery shopping, but they can be used for many other things: beach, travel, books, the gym.

Now it’s easy to do your part for the environment and look fashionable while doing it.