Why Women Love Luxury Handbags

  

There is no doubting the fact that women love luxury handbags. If you read any purse blogs or comments on purse forums you will see that some women are actually obsessed with them. Some women own a huge variety of luxury handbags which collectively may be worth many thousands of dollars. Social media and Dr Google are full images of the well-to-do, celebrities and royals who carry a different bag with each outfit – they have luxury handbags to match each color and style of their outfits.

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For the rich and famous, including celebrities and royals it is easy to possess a collection of luxury handbags. But what about the typical working woman or the stay at home mum. How can she pay such excessive prices to realise her dream of owning that latest style? The reality is that most bag-loving women will go without other things in order to satisfy her need for a new bag.

What sacrifices would you have to make to meet the expense of that elegant Hermes Birkin which recently sold at auction for over $200,000?  Made of exquisite pink crocodile decorated with 18 carat gold hardware and genuine diamonds? The run-of-the-mill Hermes will set you back about $8000 and even then, you may have to be on a waiting list to get it!

These days you probably could not get luxury handbags for much under $500. Most of the more exclusive brands will be well over $1000. So the average Jo Blog has to save up for a long just to come up with the money needed for one of these expensive bags.

Luxury handbags are the ultimate 21st-century object of desire, not just for the well-to-do, celebrities and royals, but also for working women from all walks of life as well. In this day and age, women of all ages tend to spend more on a handbag than a holiday, jewelry or even a car - and they hope that everyone else will notice their new acquisition.

Clothes commonly take second place to this most looked-for accessory. For example, an ad made in 2007 featured Kate Moss starring in a Longchamp's bag campaign She lay naked on a beach with nothing on except for her Longchamp handbag. The message this ad revealed was clear: clothes are redundant - it's all about the luxury handbag.

So why do women find luxury handbags so desirable? It is to a certain extent because they have become a distinguishing fashion statement depicting a woman's wealth and status. They also indicate how fashion aware a woman is, and proves her position and earning power. It is also due to the escalating popularity of large purses, which over the past 100 years, has mimicked the growing social independence of their women.

In previous eras, a woman's role was mostly domestic and she would keep her personal items in a purse tucked into the folds of her skirt or in a small handbag she carried discretely. But as women started venturing from the home, both for leisure and work, larger purses became a convenient way of carrying their belongings and daily needs. Eleanor Roosevelt is recognised as starting the trend of carrying large purses as a customary fashion.

At the time when rail and sea travel became more accessible, there was a growing demand for fashionable luggage such as suitcases, dressing cases, hat and shoe boxes. Styles developed and the modern leather handbag was born.

It is not surprising then that many of today's luxurious handbag design houses, such as Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Prada and Hermes, originated in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, as travel became more accessible to everyone. As women achieved more financial independence, the handbag industry prospered out of all proportion to its humble beginnings.

The fact that the right handbag can make us feel goes far deeper than just being a vehicle to carry our possessions. Both revealing and concealing, it also represents a feeling that deeply private to its owner. This feeling arises from the fact that the handbag was first designed as a silk purse or pocket worn close to the body for safe keeping.  At that time, pockets were seen as being underwear – a secret place hidden beneath lavish material and assessable only by an intimate slit in the skirt.

These intimate undertones lingered on when the first luxury handbags were worn in the late 18th century. Called reticules, they were superbly embroidered, pouches with handles in damask, satin or velvet. Women used them to carry cosmetics, a fan for flirtation, smelling salts and carte de visite, all without compromising the slim-line fit of the Empire-line dresses which were Vat the time.

To begin with, the idea of a woman displaying her personal belongings in a visible pocket was as outrageous as if she had taken off her knickers and waved them in the air. As a result of this defiance of common decency, reticules were labelled "ridicules" by those unready for change.

Because of the intimacy associated with them, luxury handbags were seen as sexual items.  The expression "old bag" was used to describe a woman who was passed her sexual best and grumpy women who display no emotion or compassion are still called that today.

In our time, luxury handbags still have their sex appeal because they are very closely associated with all of our most intimate possessions. A large purse is our survival kit for daily life. It carries all our personal needs from a mobile phone, tampons, make-up, money and keys, to hair straighteners, laptops, I-phones, chewing gum, condoms to a change of clothes. Consequently, its curiousness remains intact. Most men find the details of what a woman has in her handbag excitingly inconceivable and would never dare to invade its privacy.

Most women feel naked without their luxury handbags. Your bag rather than your clothes makes you stand out from the crowd. Even when your outfit is drab and outdated a good-looking bag makes you look and feel good.

Because of this, the handbag industry has seen incredible growth in the past few decades. By mid-2000's sales of bags were growing at twice the rate of clothes. Now the big fashion houses make millions of dollars a year from the sale of luxury handbags alone.

So what are the features that make luxury handbags desirable? The first thing is that it must have an outstanding design. It has to be instantly recognized as a prominent brand such as Fendi, Gucci, Chanel, Hermes, Louis Vuitton or from other established fashion houses. Most fashion houses have their signature designs and this too helps in appreciation of the brand itself.

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Another important feature for a luxury bag is glamour and appeal. Typically this comes from the link between a particular brand and a celebrity - such as the famous Hermes Kelly bag. Originally produced in 1935, it was not until 1956 that the bag's status shot to worldwide bestseller status. And this occurred because the newlywed, Princess Grace of Monaco, was photographed for the cover of Time magazine shielding her pregnant belly with a classic Hermes bag. The handbag in question subsequently became known as the Kelly in her honour. Fashion commentators at the time were quite adamant about the association of bag and star: Carrying a Kelly bag became synonymous with class and old money.

Another example occurred In 1994 when the Lady Dior became a sensation after Princess Diana took to wearing it around town after she separated from Prince Charles. This handbag is a seductive combination of briefcase and handbag which has distinctive gold charms. It depicted a thoughtful woman who was nonetheless glamorous and sophisticated. These days, social media can promote the status and demand for a particular bag just by been photographed on the arm of a style icon, celebrity or royal like Princess Kate Middleton.  

Shrewd marketing definitely also plays an important part in creating a must-have bag. While celebrities may always be able to get their hands on the latest luxury handbags, for the woman in the street it's much more difficult, irrespective of how much money they are ready to spend. The fact that many high-status bags are unobtainable makes it more looked-for. Some luxury handbags have waiting lists extending up to three years. The Hermes Birkin is in this category.

Women's natural competitiveness is cunningly managed by the top bag designers. For example. In 2005, Alexander McQueen inspired customer demand to a fever when he publicized the launch of his new designer bag. He specified that it was a limited edition with only 200 ever to be produced, and so it became the ultimate fashion trophy, selling out before a waiting list was even compiled. This bag was called the Novak after Kim Novak, the legendary blonde actress who starred in Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 masterpiece Vertigo. Prices started at £550 and went up to a whopping £6,000 for the deluxe crocodile version.

It seems a price tag does not prevent luxury handbags from selling well. In fact, fashion houses believe that high price tags seem to add more desire to own it. There seems to be an endless willingness to splash out on designer bags.

Luxury handbags will last a lifetime if cared for properly. Some of these styles may come and go, some retain their value and some increase in value. But it is only a handful of them that have the mystic qualities to become iconic. To become iconic, a bag is not just exceptionally well designed but it also surpasses the time in which it was fashioned.

Luxury handbags which have received the right to be called iconic are the Hermes Kelly, the Fendi Baguette, the Marc Jacobs's Stam, the YSL Muse and the Mulberry Roxanne. All of these bags share a clear, clean line; nothing fussy or over-designed, with a combination of functionality and luxury. An iconic bag owes its status to the finest traditions of pedigree, quality and craftsmanship to look as good years later as it did the day it was born. And, for a true bag lover, that is worth more than price.