Step into Bloomingdale's handbag department and the hubbub of Dubai Mall immediately fades away into a hushed awe at the treasures inside.Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Prada... each is displayed like the headline act on a stage with its own special platform and spotlight. It's a wonder they don't step up to take a bow.Customers tiptoe around, fingering the leather longingly, no one daring to ask the price. Because let's face it, if you have to ask, you can't afford it.What is it about designer handbags that makes us willing to spend a month's salary at the drop of a hat, just to get the latest arm candy?I ask one of the immaculately dressed women responsible for keeping them pristine.
She arches a purple tattooed eyebrow and speaks very slowly in a clipped Russian accent as if explaining it to a small child: "Because of the name, of course."Can she suggest an ideal designer handbag to start my collection? I am willing to invest, I say.Man arrested after a series of robberies.Her gaze runs over my attire and takes in my flip-flops, and she promptly steers me in the direction of the "bargain" section with bags priced at the Dh2,000 mark.The designer handbag may have moved out of the clutches of the elite into the mainstream, but clearly, not just anyone can be seen touting the merchandise.Milton Pedraza, chief executive of the Luxury Institute in New York, explains: "It used to be: 'The shoes make the man'. These days, the handbag makes the woman."
One has only to think of the bags that make us quiver with reverence to see his point, named after women with such style and grace that it's hard to know which came first, the bag or the panache. Sometimes all it takes is a word for us to go weak at the knees. The Kelly. The Birkin. The Stam.Customers are willing to invest large sums in a handbag or pair of shoes, Pedraza says on his blog, because they see the value of something that lasts.The bag is no longer a fashion accessory but an investment and a collectable."It is like the lust in a relationship," sighs Reema Al Khomeiri, the Dubai-based founder of ToujoursChic.ae, which rents and sells secondhand designer handbags. "Mostly it fizzles out after a while and you move on to the next one."
She arches a purple tattooed eyebrow and speaks very slowly in a clipped Russian accent as if explaining it to a small child: "Because of the name, of course."Can she suggest an ideal designer handbag to start my collection? I am willing to invest, I say.Man arrested after a series of robberies.Her gaze runs over my attire and takes in my flip-flops, and she promptly steers me in the direction of the "bargain" section with bags priced at the Dh2,000 mark.The designer handbag may have moved out of the clutches of the elite into the mainstream, but clearly, not just anyone can be seen touting the merchandise.Milton Pedraza, chief executive of the Luxury Institute in New York, explains: "It used to be: 'The shoes make the man'. These days, the handbag makes the woman."
One has only to think of the bags that make us quiver with reverence to see his point, named after women with such style and grace that it's hard to know which came first, the bag or the panache. Sometimes all it takes is a word for us to go weak at the knees. The Kelly. The Birkin. The Stam.Customers are willing to invest large sums in a handbag or pair of shoes, Pedraza says on his blog, because they see the value of something that lasts.The bag is no longer a fashion accessory but an investment and a collectable."It is like the lust in a relationship," sighs Reema Al Khomeiri, the Dubai-based founder of ToujoursChic.ae, which rents and sells secondhand designer handbags. "Mostly it fizzles out after a while and you move on to the next one."
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