This week the results of a cycling survey undertaken at City Hall revealed that London’s busiest strait for cyclists is Theobalds Road in central London, which just happens to be where the offices of Never Underdressed are situated. 

The fact that 64 per cent of all vehicles passing along Theobalds Road during morning rush hour are bikes will come as no surprise to any of us who work in Never Underdressed. We witness the phalanx  of cyclists every morning as we cross the street to the office and, in fact, we contribute to the cycling majority ourselves, with more than a couple of us choosing to commute on a bike rather than face the packed Tube or plodding buses.

Elin Evans, Never Underdressed’s junior fashion editor, pictured, is a dedicated two-wheeler, cycling to and from her home in Herne Hill every day. She calculates that she racks up 60 miles a week but, despite that impressive figure, she would never turn to traditional cycling gear. ‘I'm an avid cyclist but you'd never catch me in Lycra. There just isn't the need,’ she says. ‘Unless you're doing the Tour de France, leave the Lycra at home.’

She wears heels when cycling but admits that wedges are easier than stilettos; her only concession to practicality is that she carries a backpack rather than a traditional handbag, but this is fashion and it’s not just any old rucksack. At the moment she’s using a backpack from the Asos Black x Puma men’s collection and for next season, she has her eye on a Marni style, below.  She keeps a formal bag by her desk in case she needs to pop out to an appointment or go to an evening party or dinner straight from work.   

"The backpack is enjoying a surge in popularity that coincides with cycling going mainstream"

Daisy Dudley, a designer at Never Underdressed, also comes to work on her bike, commuting daily from Stoke Newington in north London (except for when it’s bucketing down: ‘I'm a bit of a fair-weather cyclist,' she admits, ‘if it's lashing it down I chicken out and go for this bus’). Again, heels are no problem ‘as long as they have a strap’ but she does alter outfits to suit cycling, wearing opaque tights with short skirts and avoiding long, trailing styles completely because ‘they get stuck in the brake-pads’. 

She used to just fling her bag in her basket but a recent run-in with a thief on a motorbike (are you as shocked as we are about this??) has forced her to re-evaluate and now she is on the look-out for a backpack. 

The backpack does seem to be a fashion item that is enjoying a surge in popularity that coincides with cycling going mainstream. Alison Lloyd, creative director of London accessories brand Ally Capellino, told us earlier this year that her brand has ‘been selling more and more [backpacks] and increasing the numbers that we make … From a local point of view, the increase of cycling is an obvious reason.’ 

Ally Capellino now makes a range of bags particularly for cyclists – ‘They’re waterproof, they’ve got reflective stripes, you can put laptops in them – and they don’t look too bad either,’ says Lloyd – and many other businesses are discovering the fashion cyclist market, with websites like Cycle Chic selling cutesy cycling accessories. 

"You might even catch us in stilettos on a Boris bike with our essentials packed into a little cross-body evening bag"

Among the bestsellers on the site are helmets, an issue that divides cyclists. Evans says ‘no to a cycling helmet, personal preference’ but Dudley trusts her helmet to ‘stop my hair getting wet when it’s drizzling’ as well as providing an essential safety purpose. Both rely on lights alone rather than wearing high-vis gear. 

We are big Boris bike users here at Never Underdressed too – there are several docking stations in the vicinity and Never Underdressed’s digital designer Abi Golestanian says ‘I genuinely believe that taxis and buses are much nicer to you if you're on a Boris bike as opposed to one of  those Pashley dreamboats.’ Those journeys tend to be shorter, however, (we’re not so much commuting home as nipping to Soho for drinks or  going to a press day at an agency in east London) so we alter our outfits less. You might even catch us in stilettos on a Boris bike with our essentials packed into a little cross-body evening bag. Cheaper and chicer than an Addison Lee could ever be…