Can There Ever Be Another Birkin?

ICYMI, the Birkin has been having a rather major year. 

Of course, it’s not like the Birkin is never not having a major year. 

Ever since Jacques Doillon (deliberately) ran over his wife’s beloved basket bag, and her fairy godfather, Jean-Louis Dumas, came to the rescue, the fairy-tale of the Birkin bag has fascinated our collective psyche. 

Rory from Gilmore Girls has her own fairy-tale-come-true moment when she’s gifted one of those revered receptacles by (an equally teenage) Logan Huntzberger. Samantha from Sex and the City succumbs to identity fraud for hers (that too for a *paltry* sum for $4,000). And the pilot to Netflix’s New York edition of LA-based real-estate reality show Selling Sunset, Selling the City, was titled “Workin’ for Birkin” by the showrunners.

Elsewhere on the small screen, Kim Kardashians’ “dirty Birkin” faced flak and fury upon being listed on the klan’s dedicated resale platform, Kardashian Kloset, for $70k, as did Ryan Murphy for his “totally wrong” depiction of Carolyn-Bessette Kennedy’s Birkin on the set of American Love Story.

And within the realm of reality (or maybe not so much), Japanese collector Shinsuke Sakimoto – CEO to luxury resale enterprise Valuence Holdings, had his own dream-come-true moment upon placing the winning bid on Madame Birkin’s original Birkin for a more fitting sum of $10.1 million via Sotheby’s Paris (which, with shipping and import duties, add a further 300 million yen or around $2 million to the original price tag.) 

As far as fairy tales go, this is the glass slipper everybody wants to have.

But the question is, can they?

“It’s Not Just a Bag”

It is a universally acknowledged fashion truth that one can’t simply walk into Hermès for the first time and walk out with a Birkin. 

Even if they have the moolah for it.

“It’s so hard to get your hands on an Hermès Birkin bag,” writes CNN, “that it should be illegal.” Or at least, that’s what two California plaintiffs alleged as they brought the brand to court over (what they perceived to be) unlawful tying practices. “You have to buy their shoes, their pillows … that little $900 horse to show your appreciation for the brand,” asserts one TikTok user. 

“I would walk out of the boutique and see people crying,” confesses Birkin-buyer Tessy from Switzerland to Amy Odell of the Back Row. 

Michael Tonello, of the 2008 bestseller, Bringing Home the Birkin: My Life in Hot Pursuit of the World’s Most Coveted Handbag, sides with the complainants about the reality of Hermès’ business model. “Ninety-nine per cent of the time,” he confides, “if I spent somewhere in the vicinity of $5,000 first, then asked for the bag, they would sell it to me”. 

Yet for every angsty Internet denizen angry about the auxiliary “garbage” (as an anonymous client with their heart set on a specific Kelly puts it) they have to spend a small fortune on to get offered their desired quota bag, there is a happy Hermès hunter (including our very own Megs) who snagged her own Birkin with a stroke of luck and a little bit of persistence.

Buying a Birkin, wrote Amanda, felt “as though buying one would be like pledging an exclusive sorority that doesn’t really need or want new members,” even though the storied carryall itself isn’t all that rare anymore. 

Tonello’s impression was that the Birkin “was positioned as a reward for being a good customer”. But is it really that great a reward?

It’s Not Even About the Bag

“It’s a symbol of independence,” says New York-based stylist and proud Birkin-owner, Nolan Meader. TPF member Madam Bijoux, on the other hand, chimes in, “My first Birkin (35 swift Bleu de Prusse, GHW) was in the store window. No amount of planning can substitute for pure luck.”

The truth is, for what it’s worth, the Birkin really is just a bag. Yes, as Rory’s alarmed grandmother chirps, “That is a very nice bag.” An exceptionally well-made bag from perhaps the only major leatherware label that makes things by hand en masse, by artisans it trains in its own academy, who each receive their own dedicated set of tools, using the finest of materials. 

But a bag nonetheless.

And in today’s complex luxury ecosystem, where a Margaux by The Row, a Maxi Cabas by Phoebe Philo, and a feathery Bottega skirt retail for upwards of $5,000, $8,000, and $29,000 respectively, the $13,000 price tag on a Birkin – or really, its entire product proposition – doesn’t feel all that preposterous.

After all, you can easily land your paws on quasi-Birkins ranging anywhere from Walmart’s $78 Wirkin, to Saint Laurent’s $6,000 Sac de Jour. Pharell went straight for the prize, not only in the form of the exotic gem-encrusted million-dollar Millionaire Speedy, but also his own Louis Vuitton Birkin-twin. 

And speaking of twins, the Olsen twins – themselves Hermès loyalists, as witnessed by Mary-Kate’s decrepit Kelly – also followed the orange philosophy of low-key luxury with their own label, The Row, whose Margaux bag Vogue was quick to label “a future heirloom in the making” – much like a Birkin.

So how is it that the Birkin is still on a league of its own?

Why is it that thousands still flock to Paris hoping for a leather appointment at the Rue Faubourg flagship, when “you’re more likely to get mugged during your trip to Paris than snag a leather appointment,” as Kaitlin writes?

The Beauty and the Bag

Hanna Rosin of The Atlantic says, “If bags were restaurants, the canvas tote would be a fast-casual chain. And the Birkin would be a three-star Michelin spot with a mysterious, almost mythical reservation system.”

“It was certain that the winning bid would break the record, which meant it would be reported all over the world,” Sakimoto declares, “Everyone agreed and understood that this was a good investment” – expected to generate“ in dollars, an eight-figure sum – in “advertising value” over the next decade.

You see, dear reader, the answer to why the Birkin is, well, the Birkin is that it has become a cornerstone of our culture. Today, as the corporatized fashion conglomerate has morphed into “such a mark of having arrived that it’s become a mark of trying too hard to arrive”—as the Atlantic goes on to report—luxury is merely a story of luxury, the story of aristocracy with their travel trunks and equestrian pursuits, distilled into lipstick.

And as far as stories go, the Birkin’s lore remains the most legendary.

“She was a mom. She needed places to put her mom things inside her bag,” continues Rosin. When you’re attaching those charms (or Satanic-smiling Labubus) onto your bag, you’re not simply decorating your bag but Birkin-ifying it. It’s the same with Carolyn-Bessette or Lady Diana, whose Yohji coats and “black sheep” sweaters have gone on to sell for thousands, if not millions, over their asking price, the way Birkin’s original Birkin retailed for a modest $2,000 upon its unveiling.

At the end of the day, what we want is not the bag, but the beautiful life lived in it, that unrelatable level of glamour, that quintessential, uncompromising cool, that made these women, and in turn, the very fabric of our cultural mythmaking. We strive for their authenticity, a code that a streetwear label like Telfar has cracked, but the most moneyed of maisons haven’t.

“Authenticity will always be fashion’s white whale,” writes Elle, “Turns out, the pursuit of it sells, and it sells exceedingly well.” The next Birkin might just, in fact, be in your own closet as we speak!