The diaper bag Meng couldn't find, so she made it

Common Threads / Huhu

Some of the best products start as somebody's private frustration. Huhu is one of those.

Meng's younger son was around 10 months old when the easy part ended. Before that she could put him in a carrier and walk out the door. After that, a twenty minute errand meant packing up half the house, and then standing on a sidewalk digging through a bag while a kid who had no interest in waiting made that very clear. Everything went into that bag. Nothing ever came back out of it.

So she tried another bag. Then another. She has said she tried a lot of them, and they all did the same thing.

That's the part I keep coming back to. Most of us stop right there. You buy the next bag, it disappoints you the same way, and at some point you quietly decide this is just what having small kids is like and you stop expecting better.

Meng didn't do that. She started writing down what a diaper bag actually has to do, during nap times and long work calls, and she sketched some ideas next to the list.

The sketches turned into renders. The renders turned into an actual prototype. Then came hundreds of hours of research and testing and revision, the unglamorous middle part nobody posts about, before any of it was something you could buy.

"I felt like I was missing something and kept thinking, 'there has to be a better option than this.' Eventually I asked myself - maybe I should go make this? So, during nap times and long work calls, I started listing out things a diaper bag needs to offer and doodled some designs."

What it turned into

It's not one bag anymore. There's the Everyday Diaper Backpack and the Roam Crossbody, plus the Go Anywhere Changing Wallet, the Insulated Cooler Bag, the All-Purpose Storage Pouches, the Essential Stroller Hooks, and a kids line so the smaller person in your house can carry their own stuff.

What I notice about that list is that every piece is an answer to something specific. Not a category she expanded into because the market said to. The cooler exists because snacks need to stay cold and bottles need to stay warm on the same outing. The stroller hooks exist because your hands are full. These are problems she personally ran into.

And the bags don't announce themselves. You can carry the backpack without it broadcasting that you have a baby, right up until you open it and it's clearly built for exactly that.

Why we picked her

The products are genuinely good. But that's not the thing.

Common Threads exists because I wanted somewhere to put the stories behind the brands on CULTR, and Meng's is the shape I had in mind when I started it. A parent hit the same wall a few million other parents hit, and instead of accepting it, she went and built the thing that didn't exist. Slowly. Around a job and around her kids.

She wrote once that she hopes Huhu makes you feel like parent of the year, and then admitted that's a lot to ask of a diaper bag. I love that she said the second part.

Fed up with clunky, outdated diaper bags while raising two kids, designer Meng Li took notes from high-performance hiking and transit gear to create something better. The result? Huhu—a sleek, adventure-ready backpack built for caregivers who refuse to compromise on style or utility. Effortless to carry and seamlessly organized, it features a game-changing one-handed magnetic opening, customizable dividers, quick-access pockets, and ultra-cushioned straps designed for every body.

Shop Huhu on CULTR.

Common Threads is where we tell the stories of the makers on CULTR. If you run a brand here and want yours told, reply to any email from us and we'll start there.