What holds your travel card?

Living in London means constant travelling, more so via public transport than my car. Although I love driving (Nobody can see the slippers you wear to drive or hear you imitating Adele), it isn’t always possible due to the horrendous traffic which is a regular occurrence as well as the congestion charge (which I hate paying and which, no matter what anyone says does not decrease traffic thank you very much!). So I take the much easier public transport easily available and quite reliable. When I got my Oyster card (those that don’t live in London, it’s a refillable card you use to top up and travel on buses and trains) I got a tacky plastic wallet with it, which was yellow in colour with a huge ikea advertisement on the front. I love yellow so that wasn’t an issue, but an Ikea advertisement? Really? Who on earth is going to look down at their Oyster and think ‘Oh, I need to go to Ikea for a spot of flat packed furniture shopping! ‘- major fail marketers, this is not how commuters think.

So, the search was on for a decent Oyster card holder which looked chic. There are tons of the plastic ones with different designs easily available online, but I was far more fussier- I wanted leather. Yes, premium brands do do them but I wasn’t going to spend a small fortune on an Oyster card holder, I wanted something relatively easy on the purse but still classy enough.

Enter Aspinal- now now, I can’t say I love the brand or anything (some of the leathers, the craftsmanship and totally overpriced handbags put me off completely) BUT, when I saw these, I knew I’d have one-

Designed well in an array of colours and textures (you can choose from smooth leathers to textured ones) and starting at just £20, I was sold. It is sold as a credit card holder, but I use it for my Oyster and find it a pleasure to use. It has got me compliments often, and I am sure that if there were even more colours I would buy more to change up each season. I ended up sticking with the black colourway which I love but am tempted to go for the red- it's just too adorable to pass up.

Do the standard Oyster card holders bother you or not? Why?

Ta ta!