Bugaboos are a familiar sight around town these days, but when Max Barenbrug designed his pushchair back in 1994 it was like nothing else on Earth.
Unlike traditional prams and strollers, Barenbrug’s modular design could cope with anything from urban jungles to off-road adventures. Sales rocketed when the Bugaboo was featured in Sex and the City, and the brand is now trusted by more than a million mums and dads worldwide.
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There are several models of Bugaboo to choose from, and the 2018 range is the best yet. Whether you’re planning to pound the streets, run around the park or venture far from the beaten track, there’s a Bugaboo for you - and a dizzying range of accessories and optional extras to make it fit your needs precisely.
Who knew a smartphone holder for pushchairs even existed? Other accessories include rain covers and mosquito nets, cupholders for the coffees you’ll be going through at a record rate, carrycots and even upgrades to the handlebars to give them a leather look.
We’d strongly recommend hanging off on the accessories until you’ve spent a bit of time with your Bugaboo pushchair or stroller, though: what seems like a must-have when you’re browsing a brochure often ends up gathering dust at the back of a cupboard, and pushchair accessories aren’t cheap.
Before you start, make sure you think about the predominant use of your pushchair; if you will be largely using your buggy to navigate pavements during the school run, you won't need a pushchair with hefty wheels but rather something lighter and a bit more nimble. If you find yourself out and about on unusual tough terrain more than once or twice a week, ensure you check out the Bugaboo options that are a little more adaptable with different wheel options and firmer centre of gravity. For those of you who are planning to add to your brood, the Bugaboo Donkey Duo is a sure bet as it can be used as a single buggy until the time is right.
Once you have acquired your perfect, super-stylish Bugaboo pushchair, let us help you complete your 'out and about' kit with one of our top picks for the best and most stylish changing bags.
The Bugaboo Bee 5 is designed for “urban adventurers”, the blurb says. It’s a very lightweight city stroller - maybe even a little too light for more challenging terrain - with endless customisation options and a host of improvements over the previous model: better suspension, a redesigned seat (now in two sections rather than one) and a pocket in the under-seat basket.
The handlebars are vegan leather, there are nearly 800 colour combinations and it’s a doddle to use on public transport and in busy streets. The newly redesigned front wheels mean the Bee 5 scores top points for maneuverability. It’s cheap by Bugaboo standards, although if you start playing with the options list you can easily make it a lot more expensive.
Did you spend the final weeks of your pregnancy trying to persuade the doctors to let you run marathons? Do you prefer sprinting around the streets to slowly going crazy in a soft play? Then the Bugaboo Runner is the buggy for you because it means you can pound the pavements - or go off-road - without scaring the living daylights out of your baby.
The Runner’s frame and wheels give baby a smooth ride no matter what the terrain, and it’s perfectly designed so that you can run without having to adopt a silly posture or adjust your gait to avoid kneeing the pushchair. That makes it bigger and heavier than city strollers, but then city strollers tend to get grumpy if you walk too fast.
If you're new to the running game - and you already own a Bugaboo seat - you can buy the Bugaboo Runner Chassis separately, which is compatible with the Chameleon, Bee, Donkey and Buffalo seats.
The clue is in the title with this pushchair, it truly is designed to adapt to any environment you throw at it. The Cameleon is a versatile all-in-one pushchair that will take well to grass, mud, sand, you name it. But, this third generation Cameleon has a Marmite feature: the brake’s a handbrake, not the more common footbrake, and that might annoy you immensely.
If not, you’re looking at a city stroller that’s perfectly capable of handling rougher terrain, and there’s adjustable suspension to keep baby insulated from lumps and bumps. One particularly clever idea is the swappable wheels: you can spin the bottom of the chassis so the two wheels are at the front and one on the back when you’re going off-road, and go back to the familiar three-wheel layout when you hit tarmac again. If you regularly stroll along the beach, this is definitely the Bugaboo pushchair for you.
The Cameleon is ludicrously expensive, of course, but given it’s a very stylish and very cleverly designed stroller with a huge range of personalisation options, it's easy to see why it is Bugaboo's best selling pushchair.
Some pushchairs keel over if you consider putting as much as a handbag on the handlebars. Not the Buffalo: it’s certified to stay upright with up to 6kg on the bars when it’s empty. It’s been designed with practicality in mind from the no-puncture foam wheels, the height adjustable handlebars and a four-wheel layout that copes better with difficult terrain than a three-wheeler would.
There’s also a two-wheel option for tough conditions such as sand or snow, or for navigating stairs. If you are the parent that often finds yourself with shopping bags, kids lunch boxes and a whole host of other luggage hanging from every spare hook of your buggy, this is the only Bugaboo pushchair you need.
As you’d expect from such a hefty pushchair it’s a little on the big side, and heavier than other options. But if you prefer meadows to malls this is the Bugaboo to buy.
The Bugaboo Donkey is designed to answer many parents’ big question: how can you take two kids around without pushing something the size of a bus or the length of a yacht?
The Donkey manages it with a combination of really clever design - you can have a buggy and a carrycot or car seat, have one child facing forward and one facing back - and quite slim seats that enable it to be just 74cm wide. If big babies run in your family, they may outgrow this one sooner than you might like. Size aside, this is a brilliantly designed buggy. If you decide to reduce this double buggy back down to a single pushchair (which you can do in seconds) there is a super handy side luggage basket that can sit alongside the remaining seat.
There’s also a footbrake - hurrah! - and adjustable handles, a two-wheel mode for sand or snow or stairs and it’s easy to change seats around or fold the buggy up.
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