diff --git a/i3bar/src/xcb.c b/i3bar/src/xcb.c
index 3360485a..c9f8e6cb 100644
--- a/i3bar/src/xcb.c
+++ b/i3bar/src/xcb.c
@@ -489,7 +489,7 @@ void handle_button(xcb_button_press_event_t *event) {
     size_t namelen = 0;
     const char *utf8_name = cur_ws->canonical_name;
     for (const char *walk = utf8_name; *walk != '\0'; walk++) {
-        if (*walk == '"')
+        if (*walk == '"' || *walk == '\\')
             num_quotes++;
         /* While we’re looping through the name anyway, we can save one
          * strlen(). */
@@ -503,7 +503,7 @@ void handle_button(xcb_button_press_event_t *event) {
     for (inpos = 0, outpos = strlen("workspace \"");
          inpos < namelen;
          inpos++, outpos++) {
-        if (utf8_name[inpos] == '"') {
+        if (utf8_name[inpos] == '"' || utf8_name[inpos] == '\\') {
             buffer[outpos] = '\\';
             outpos++;
         }
diff --git a/src/commands_parser.c b/src/commands_parser.c
index f325a048..fa4c2360 100644
--- a/src/commands_parser.c
+++ b/src/commands_parser.c
@@ -216,8 +216,9 @@ char *parse_string(const char **walk, bool as_word) {
     if (**walk == '"') {
         beginning++;
         (*walk)++;
-        while (**walk != '\0' && (**walk != '"' || *(*walk - 1) == '\\'))
-            (*walk)++;
+        for (; **walk != '\0' && **walk != '"'; (*walk)++)
+            if (**walk == '\\' && *(*walk + 1) != '\0')
+                (*walk)++;
     } else {
         if (!as_word) {
             /* For a string (starting with 's'), the delimiters are
@@ -248,10 +249,10 @@ char *parse_string(const char **walk, bool as_word) {
     for (inpos = 0, outpos = 0;
          inpos < (*walk - beginning);
          inpos++, outpos++) {
-        /* We only handle escaped double quotes to not break
-         * backwards compatibility with people using \w in
-         * regular expressions etc. */
-        if (beginning[inpos] == '\\' && beginning[inpos + 1] == '"')
+        /* We only handle escaped double quotes and backslashes to not break
+         * backwards compatibility with people using \w in regular expressions
+         * etc. */
+        if (beginning[inpos] == '\\' && (beginning[inpos + 1] == '"' || beginning[inpos + 1] == '\\'))
             inpos++;
         str[outpos] = beginning[inpos];
     }