This is Highly Recommend, a column dedicated to what we’re eating, drinking, and buying.. Here, Ali Francis waxes poetic on the water bottle she doesn’t leave home without.
About the coolest thing you can be on TikTok these days is supremely hydrated. Take a scroll through #WaterTok—a special corner of the app for people whose idea of #goals is clear pee every day—and you’ll find grandmas gushing over pastel Stanley Cups, ice-maker devotees, and obsessives dedicated to their chaotic “water of the day” regimes.
You’ll also run into my people: the hydration enthusiasts ahead of our time who’ve long known that the Owala FreeSip water bottle is the best drinking vessel on planet Earth. I currently own the 32-ounce option of this suddenly-very-trendy bottle in a retired colorway that most closely resembles “Poolside Punch.” (I also had something akin to “Tide Me Over” but tragically left her on a train headed from Munich to Berlin last year after drinking “a good amount” of tall boys. RIP, gorgeous.)
For the unacquainted, Owala makes stunning brightly colored insulated water bottles and tumblers that look more like sculptural ornaments you’d find in the MoMa Design Store than functional canisters for hauling around your liquids. The eye appeal here is strong and Owala knows this: In a move that only brands with fervent, cult-like followings can pull off, it drops a new special-edition color every couple of weeks.
Aesthetics are only the hook, though; the Owala FreeSip is so much more than a pretty bottle. I am infamous in my family for spilling beverages. (Exhibit A: the summer of 2005, when I poured an entire can of grape soda all over my brother’s synthesizer. I still haven’t been forgiven.) Lucky for my fellow clumsies and me, the Owala bottle features a 100% leak-and-spill-proof cap that makes a delightful little click! when locked and flips open at the press of a button. The cap also moonlights as a security guard, protecting the mouthpiece from outside germs.
Unlike most water bottles on the market, Owala doesn’t pretend to know how you like to drink. The mouthpiece is designed for two types of people: those who will only sip and those who live to chug. Underneath the cap you’ll notice both a built-in straw that reaches virtually all the way to the bottom (so no drop gets left behind) and a regular drinking spout for people who prefer to tilt their heads back and swig like pirates hitting a growler of rum.
Though it’s certainly not a selling point unique to Owala, I appreciate that the triple-insulated stainless steel body keeps my water cold. The plastic loop that latches over the cap also makes it easy to attach the bottle to my backpack on long hikes. And, whenever the lid eventually dies from overuse (click! click! click!) or I forget to wash my straw for years, I love that I can replace them separately without having to fork out for a new bottle.
Then again, who am I kidding? I’m obviously going to score this mulberry jam cutie the second it drops.