For the Love of Bags

This is a picture of a brand new Louis Vuitton bag courtesy of Eluxury. It is a Monogram Canvas Lockit. Observe that the leather trim is a very light beige shade that is a creamy white.

I can vouch for this colour on the leather straps because my new Speedy 25 started out that way. The thing about this leather is that it is meant to age with time. As it is exposed to the sun and to the oils on your hands and skin it will slowly turn a honey brown, getting darker and darker over time. I love the way the monogram looks with the dark honey brown straps.

I did not like the light leather when I first got the bag, so before I started using it, I would leave it out in the sun to encourage it to age faster. Having light leather trim makes the bag look fake because there are so many fake Louis Vuitton bags out there and you will notice that most fakes have this light trim that never age.

So, one of the true tests of whether the Louis Vuitton bag is real or fake is to check the leather trim. A new Louis Vuitton bag will never have honey brown straps.

Anyway, I was quite surprised when I was told recently about someone (Edit: For avoidance of doubt, it is a mutual friend of mine LC in Canada) who had inherited a Louis Vuitton Petit Bucket bag and she felt that the leather trim was “old and dark. So, she took it to the LV store and had the leather changed to the new pale trim because “I like the light leather trim”. This cost over RM2000. You could get a new LV bag (almost) with RM2000!!

I wonder if she realises that the leather will darken again as she uses the bag. Will she spend another RM2000 in a couple of years to change the straps to “look new” again? Doesn’t she realise that an LV bag with leather that never ages screams “FAKE”!!!

p/s I wasn’t even aware that LV would do this for you so that goes to show you that you learn something new everyday!

S-Kay asked me on My Women Stuff to write about how to store the many bags that bag-lovers will inevitably have. I thought I’d showcase some ideas on how to store your bags based on my experience.

At present, I mainly use an Antonius wire basket purchased from Ikea (left). It cost RM10 or RM15 and if you arrange your bags nicely, it holds quite a lot. I place it on the floor of my wardrobe and I have about 4 (yikes!). The nice thing about using this wire basket is that you have access to all your bags at one go once you pull out the basket.

The other way which I am thinking of using is a plastic box like the Samla from Ikea.  I’m still toying with the idea at the moment but I reckon it will work if you have storage space above your wardrobe. You can cover it with a lid to keep out the dust and its opaque so you can see the bags inside it. You could also use any number of plastic boxes available in the market.

These are just 2 options so far. I’ll update as and when I think up more options. Stay tuned!