IT’S ALL IN THE BAG

Louis Vuitton	Pucci bag packs a punch on the Runway

The handbag (or purse) is the new celebrity. It was shown on the runway, like a Hollywood offspring, and women everywhere covet them as if they were gold bullion. For many top fashion designers the handbag is a walking billboard and a real money maker. When you realize that Ralph Lauren hauls in $12,000 for one handbag (albeit in wildlife skin), you have to admit that accessories are now the Belle of the Ball.

According to the fashion press, “It was a season of bags and shoes, as Suzy Menkes pointed out in The International Herald Tribune. At the Christian Lacroix show this point was put across so baldly that each model sashayed down a vivid green runway, stopped for the cameras and then, apparently as instructed, awkwardly held out her purse.

Strong brands need billboards and memorable images - the ones that will be most often reproduced, most copied and that will, ultimately, sell the most bags… That is precisely the trick Marc Jacobs pulled off in the nearly 10 years since he has been at Louis Vuitton. The proof can be found at the label’s flagship store on the Champs-Élysées. On most any day you can find a big crowd lining up behind velvet ropes there, waiting to get inside with an enthusiasm rarely seen outside Space Mountain and a reverence that puts one in mind of church.

What it’s all about in this business, finally, is memory of brand,” said Serge Brunschwig, recently charged with reviving Celine for LVMH. What it is all about, this and every fashion season, is selling consumers on the dream that in a handbag can be found the secret to having a life more glamorous, dimensioned and storybook than one’s own.”

I agree. The Handbag is the celebrity today….tell that to Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie!