The Birkin bag is a
personal accessory of luggage or a tote by Hermès that is handmade
in leather and named after actress and singer Jane Birkin. The bag is
currently in fashion as a symbol of wealth due to its high price and
use by celebrities.
Its prices range
from £7,500 to £100,000 (US$11,550 to US$150,000). Costs escalate
according to the type of leather and if exotic skins were used. The
bags are distributed to Hermès boutiques on unpredictable schedules
and in limited quantities, creating artificial scarcity and
exclusivity. Small versions (25 cm) may be considered a handbag or
purse.
In 1981, Hermès
chief executive Jean-Louis Dumas was seated next to Jane Birkin on a
flight from Paris to London. She had just placed her straw travelling
bag in the overhead compartment for her seat, but the contents fell
to the deck, leaving her to scramble to replace them. Birkin
explained to Dumas that it had been difficult to find a leather
weekend bag she liked.
In 1984, he created
a black supple leather bag for her, based on a 1982 design. She used
the bag initially, but changed her mind because she was carrying too
many things in it: “What’s the use of having a second one?” she
said laughingly. “You only need one and that busts your arm;
they’re bloody heavy. I’m going to have to have an operation for
tendonitis in the shoulder." Nevertheless, since that time, the
bag has become a status symbol.
In an August 2015
New York Times article and its accompanying style feature video by
Bill Cunningham a moulded rubber bag bearing the same style seemed to
have become ubiquitous in Manhattan, along with examples of the
authentic ones. A significantly lower cost was reported for the
rubber totes, being comparable to typical leather handbags.
Design
Birkin bags are sold
in a range of sizes. Each one may be made to order with different
customer-chosen hides, colour, and hardware fixtures. There are other
individual options, such as diamond-encrusting.
The bag also
comes in a variety of hides such as calf leather, lizard, and
ostrich. Among the most expensive used to be saltwater crocodile skin
and bags with smaller scales cost more than those with larger scales.
In 2015, however, Jane Birkin asked Hermès to stop using her name
for the crocodile version due to ethical concerns. Each bag is lined
with goat-skin, the colour of the interior matching the exterior.
Prices for the Birkin bag depend on type of skin, the colour, and
hardware fixtures.[8]
Sizes range from
25-, 30-, 35-, to 40-centimeters, with travelling bags of 50- and
55-centimeters. It also comes in a variety of colours such as black,
brown, golden tan, navy blue, olive green, orange, pink, powder blue,
red, and white.
* The bag has a lock
and keys. The keys are enclosed in a leather lanyard known as a
clochette, carried by looping it through a handle. The bag is locked
by closing the top flaps over buckle loops, wrapping the buckle
straps, or closing the lock on the front hardware. Locks and keys are
number-coded. Early locks only bore one number on the bottom of the
lock. In more recent years, Hermès has added a second number under
the Hermes stamp of the lock. The numbers for locks may be the same
for hundreds of locks, as they are batch numbers in which the locks
were made.
The metallic
hardware (the lock, keys, buckle hardware, and base studs) are plated
with gold or palladium to prevent tarnishing. Hardware is updated
regularly to maintain the quality available in the industry at time
of production. The metal lock may be covered with leather as a custom
option. Detailing with diamonds is another custom option.
Hermès offers a
"spa treatment" – a reconditioning for heavily-used bags.
A "Shooting
Star" Birkin has a metallic image resembling a shooting star,
stamped adjacent to the "Hermès, Paris Made in France"
stamp, that is in gold or silver to match the hardware and embossing.
Rarely, the stamp is blind or colourless, if the bag is made of one
or two leathers onto which no metallic stamping is used. Sometimes,
Birkins or other Hermès bags may be made by independent artisans for
"personal use", but only once a year. Every bag bears the
stamp of the artisan who made the bag. These identifications vary
widely, but are not different for every bag made. Finding stamps of
more than one artisan on a bag occurs because the stamp is not a
serial reference. Fonts and the order of stamping may vary, depending
on the artisans.
The Birkin bag
may be distinguished from the similar Hermès Kelly handbag by the
number of its handles. The single-handle handbag is the Kelly, but
the Birkin has two handles.
The bags are
handmade in France by expert artisans. The company's signature saddle
stitching, developed in the 1800s, is another distinctive feature.
Each bag is
hand-sewn, buffed, painted, and polished, taking several days to
finish. An average bag is created in 48 hours. Leathers are obtained
from different tanners in France, resulting in varying smells and
textures. Because of varying individual skills, other details of the
bags may not match with other bags. The company justifies the cost of
the Birkin bag, compared to other bags, based on the meticulous
craftsmanship and scarcity.
According to a 2014
estimate, Hermès produced 70,000 Birkin bags that year. The bag is
highly coveted and, for several years, was reputed to have a waiting
list of up to six years. The rarity of these bags are purportedly
designed to increase demand by collectors.
As a result of the
strong demand, the Birkin bag has a high resale value in many
countries, especially in Asia, and to such an extent that the bag is
considered by some people as an instrument of investment. One 2016
study found that Birkin bags had average annual returns of 14.2%
between 1980 and 2015, significantly beating the S&P 500 Index.
In April 2010, Hermès announced that the waiting list would no
longer exist, implying that it is potentially available to all.
The Philippine Star
reported in March 2013, that a very high-end, 30-cm Shiny Rouge H
Porosus Crocodile Birkin with 18K gold fittings and encrusted with
diamonds fetched US$203,150 at an auction in Dallas, Texas.
In her memoir, The
Primates of Park Avenue, author Wednesday Martin recounts how Birkin
bags signal social class status on the Upper East Side.
Hermès
and Jane Birkin resolve spat over crocodile handbags
Actor
withdrew name from product after Peta video showed cruelty at
slaughter farm, which French luxury fashion house says was isolated
incident
Angelique Chrisafis
in Paris
Friday 11 September
2015 18.49 BST
In the moneyed and
cut-throat world of French luxury goods, no brand dares lose a
glamorous ambassador in a public spat over a handbag. So it was with
relief that the fashion house Hermès announced on Friday it had
patched things up with the actor and singer Jane Birkin, following a
row over animal rights.
In July, Birkin had
demanded Hermès remove her name from its Birkin Croco bag after
learning of “cruel practices” used against crocodiles in its
production. She had been moved to act after seeing a video released
by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, showing how live
reptiles were skinned or sawed open on farms that supplied luxury
brands.
On Friday, however,
the French leather-goods firm said it had identified an “isolated
irregularity” in the slaughter process at a crocodile farm in Texas
and had warned the farm it would cease any relations should it
continue to neglect its recommended procedures.
“Jane Birkin has
advised us that she is satisfied by the measures taken by Hermès,”
the company added.
Birkin’s public
takedown of Hermès over the Birkin Croco – one of the world’s
most expensive and sought-after handbags – had been a fashion world
embarrassment.
Birkin is still
hugely popular in France, where she arrived in the 1960s as a
21-year-old, awkwardly shy, home counties English rose and shot to
fame singing the the 1969 heavy-breathing melody Je T’aime Moi Non
Plus with her partner, Serge Gainsbourg, France’s biggest rock
star, poet and provocateur.
The story of the
chance invention of the Hermès Birkin bag had long been one of the
cleverest marketing narratives in the luxury goods world, providing a
human touch often missing from sleek leather products.
In the 1980s, so the
tale goes, Birkin had been upgraded on an Air France flight and was
fiddling with the contents that had fallen out of a mundane handbag,
two days after her then-husband, Jacques Doillon, had reversed his
car over the cherished basket she used to carry as well, “crushing
it on purpose”.
When the passenger
sat next to her suggested she needed a bag with pockets, she said:
“The day Hermès makes one with pockets I will have that.” He
turned out to be the Hermès chief executive and they came up with a
design together on the back of a sick bag, in exchange for the use of
her name.
Hermès prides
itself on its reputation. The company is one of the world’s last
high-end labels to remain independent, defiantly resisting
conglomerates and what it scathingly calls “mass-market
techniques”. It is still controlled by various branches of the
family descended from the saddlemaker who founded the firm in 1837.
Its status and
traditional production methods – each bag is made by hand in France
by one artisan devoted entirely to that piece – have seen it boost
sales and weather various financial crises that have shaken other
parts of the luxury goods market.
The Birkin Croco –
with a starting retail price of more than €20,000 (£14,700) –
and its cousin, the Kelly, named after actress Grace Kelly, are among
the most sought-after luxury goods in the world.
Birkin bags comes in
all types of materials, from leather to ostrich skin, and Hermès
produces fewer than there is demand for, creating waiting lists that
have seemingly made celebrities from Victoria Beckham to the
Kardashians, even keener to acquire their own and be photographed
carrying one.
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