Once your Little has outgrown a harnessed car seat and is ready for a booster seat, the choices can be a bit overwhelming. There are a wide variety of booster seats on the market, high back, backless, with large belt guides, lots of padding, small belt guides, minimal padding, the options seem endless. Peg Perego, an Italian children’s product company, makes the luxurious Viaggio HBB 120 booster, the star of this post. It’s one of the narrowest booster seats on the market so it’s a nice option for tight spots.
Peg Perego Viaggio HBB: 6 years old
CSFTL Quick Stats
- High back booster weight range: 40-120 pounds
- High back booster height range: 39-57 inches tall
- Backless booster weight range: 40-120 pounds
- Backless booster height range: 39-57 inches tall
- Highest booster guide position: 19 inches
- Rigid lower anchor connectors
- 7 year expiration
- Requires vehicle head restraint support
- 2014 IIHS Best Bet when used in high back mode
Lower Anchor Connectors
The Viaggio HBB 120 comes with lower latch anchors. These allow the seat to remain anchored in the vehicle when not in use, so that you do not have to remember to buckle it in when it’s not occupied by a child.
These anchors operate with ease — there is a push button just under the fabric in the front center in the bottom of the seat. To extend the strap attached to the LATCH connectors, you just reach under the cover, press the button and let out enough slack to attach the lower anchors to the latch points in the vehicle. Then, pull on the front strap to tighten the seat into place. This feature is one of the easiest lower anchor systems I have ever used!
The adjustable high back is another nice feature of this booster. It is designed to be easily adjusted while your child is sitting in the seat. I had the back set too low for my daughter and I was able to easily click it up to the right height setting so that she could ride safely and comfortably.
Another key, nice-to-have feature is the option of having the booster recline, which is great if you have children who tend to fall asleep in the car. The moveable foot for the recline is spring loaded; just pull the handle in the front of the seat while lifting it up and the foot easily pops out into reclined position. That’s it! The recline will automatically follow your vehicles seat back. To put the seat back into its original position, just pull on the handle again and push the seat downward.
Overall, this booster has been one of my favorite boosters to work with. The only small drawbacks I could find were:
- A vehicle headrest is required for use in high back mode.
- The cup holders do not have a bottom to them. It is a very small drawback, but my daughter was looking for a place to store her crayons while we were driving. In the grand scheme of things it’s not a big deal and wouldn’t stop me from buying the seat but it’s something a child may notice.
Fit to Child
6 Years Old
Peg Perego Viaggio HBB: 6 years old
This model is 6.5 years old, weighs 54 pounds, and is 48 inches tall. She’s fairly new to booster riding but has been able to buckle herself into the Viaggio without issue. The belt fit is great — the lap portion of the vehicle seat belt lays across the tops of her thighs and the shoulder portion lays right across the middle of her collarbone.
8 Years Old
Kids need a booster seat until they are 10-12 years old, and the 120 pound weight limit of the Peg Perego Viaggio HBB should easily get them there. Our Huggable Images doll, is 8 years old, 80 pounds and 4 feet 9 inches tall. He fits in high back mode on the very tallest setting.
Our human model is standing next to the doll for a comparison. She is 9 & 1/2 years old, weighs 50 pounds, and is 4 feet 4 inches tall. With her short torso, she winds up being two clicks below the full extension of the headrest.
Cover
The Viaggio’s cover is quite plush. It’s similar to the material found in a high-end luxury car — plush and comfortable. The stitching in the fabric is well done and the seat is amply padded.
One of our models found the seat comfortable. She had her tailbone removed due to a medical condition so finding a comfortable spot to sit is often a challenge for her. I knew this booster was a winner for her when I would find her sitting in the booster while watching TV in the living room rather than sitting on our couch. I dare say it would be a good contender for a long distance road trip!
Cleaning the Cover
Of course, now that we’ve had some use the seat naturally needed a little cleaning. Fortunately, the manual is fairly straightforward in regards to cleaning & maintenance. Pages 31 through 37 in the USA manual detail how to take the hard backing off so that you’re able to access the loops holding the fabric on to the seat. It also reminds you to take care while removing the padding so that you do not damage the EPS foam under the fabric.
It was a little hard to remove the plastic backing my first time, but after then I was fairly confident in knowing what I was doing so I was less intimidated by disassembling the seat as time went on.
This is the seat taken apart, minus the cover that was being washed.
Here you can see how thick and plush the seats padding really is! No wonder my children find it so comfortable.
The manual goes into detailed instructions for disassembly and reassembly of the seat. The first time I had reassembled it took me a moment to get everything lined up to reattach. In the photo, you can see pieces of the seat back and where they needed to line up with the seat body for proper reassembly.
Once I got everything lined up, it was a matter of just “popping” it all back into place and the seat looked good as new.
Overall Thoughts
5 years after this seat arrived on our doorstep, we’re still as pleased with this seat now as we were at first! It’s proven itself as a well-cushioned booster seat that works well in tight spaces — we have it on the 40 section of our car’s 60/40 split bench seat. It’s narrow enough that we can move that section of the seat forward for access to the third row while the booster remains in place.
If the Peg Perego Primo Viaggio HBB 120 has impressed you as much as it has us, check out the cover options at Amazon.com. Peg Perego was kind enough to provide the seat for this review, but we’re not otherwise compensated. As always, our opinions are all our own. Thank you to Huggable Images for providing the safety training dolls used in this review!
Originally written by Jade Sanford. Edits maintained by the CSFTL Editorial Team.
