This Away Personalized Luggage Set Is the Best Gift I've Given My Wife in 10 Years

Sorry for the cro-magnon male cliche, but I am awful at buying gifts for my wife. Guessing her taste in new jewelry is near impossible, and clothes are obviously out for the same reason.

She’s flush with spa gift certificates and our kids now have the market cornered on the sentimental and funny. A functional gift, you say? That’s an unintended insult waiting to happen. Sephora makes me lightheaded, and I can’t quite yet afford to do one of those big-red-ribbon, new car surprises (but seriously, who can afford to do that?).

But with my last attempt, I earned some leeway for a few bad ones — because according to her, I nailed it. She recently started a new job that has her traveling for work every month, and despite us having acquired approximately 3,000 bags of varying sizes over the course of our life together, she didn’t have a proper multi-day luggage set. Enter, Away. And not just any Away, but personalized Away.

She loves a good monogram, and the design options on their website make the choices easy, even for an idiot husband like me. I got her the Bigger Carry-on in green with gold lettering: it is sturdy, so damn easy to pack, and seemingly fits a carload of clothes, shoes and… shoes.

To buy: away.com, $255 with monogram stamp

I coupled that with the Weekender in natural canvas with more gold lettering, and that fits even more shoes and accessories.

To buy: away.com, $280 with monogram embroidery

On her three-day trips she can take either piece on its own, but combined they can get her through the longer ones — including that eventual two-week trip to Europe that I’m planning for my next gift.

Crap, honey, don’t read that last part.

Seriously though, each fits so much and is so easy to maneuver, it makes me angry it took us so long to upgrade. I might have to get a set for our daughters, too, so I don’t screw up their gifts either.