Loose Threads
Loro Piana, the stealth wealth icon of colorless cashmere, has been placed under court monitoring in Italy following an investigation into its supply chain. A factory making Loro Piana cashmere jackets — which can easily sell for around $7,000 — was found to employ ten Chinese workers, five of them illegal immigrants, Reuters reports, “who were forced to work up to 90 hours a week, seven days a week, were paid 4 euros an hour, and slept in rooms illegally set up inside the factory.” One worker reported that, after demanding nearly $12,000 in unpaid wages, the owner beat him badly enough that he needed 45 days of treatment for injuries.
Marni has a new designer: Meryll Rogge, who previously worked at Marc Jacobs and led women’s design for Dries Van Noten. She is one of the few women to serve as creative director at a major luxury house and only the fourth to do so at Marni.
Rihanna’s Smurfs promo tour continues to delight. She brought her boys RZA and Riot to the L.A. premiere wearing painfully adorable miniature versions of Jonathan Anderson’s debut Dior Men’s collection.
Apparently leggings are finally on the way out. Let’s admit it — they are truly not all that comfortable!
And now, onto today’s big story…
Inside the Wild Secondhand Birkin Market
Earlier in Back Row:
The sale of the original Birkin bag owned by Jane Birkin last week for $10.1 million was incredible advertising for Hermès. But it was even better exposure for the secondhand market, where Birkins and Kellys regularly sell for multiples of their already astronomical retail prices.
Valuence Japan, which bought the original Birkin, is a luxury resale company that said in a press release it plans to display the bag for the public. Valuence’s brands, including Nanboya and Star Buyers Auction, sell Birkins and Kellys secondhand.
Secondhand luxury handbag market experts think the auction of the original Birkin was a unicorn event, in the vein of Dorothy’s original ruby slippers from the Wizard of Oz, which were sold by Heritage Auctions last year for $32.5 million, the most ever spent on movie memorabilia. One expert told me the bag would have fetched even more money had the stickers Birkin applied been left alone. (The bag appeared to contain circular marks where the stickers used to be.)
Resale quota bags (Birkins and Kellys, purchases of which Hermès limits two per customer per year) have long been selling on the secondary market for the prices of new cars, if not much, much more. New Kellys start at $10,700 and Birkins at $12,700, while you can buy a pre-owned pale gray Kelly bag with signs of wear for $12,500 and a black Birkin 35 with signs of “heavy” use for $17,000. But if you want a small black Birkin in new condition, expect to pay around $30,000 secondhand. And if you want a croc Himalayan Birkin secondhand, you’re looking at a price well into six figures.
But secondhand buyers don’t have to play the game of acquiring a bunch of other expensive stuff in an Hermès boutique before a sales associate invites them to purchase a bag. While many are the same über-wealthy Very Important Clients who drop six figures at the boutiques like they’re buying a matcha latte at Starbucks, not all are rich, and not all want to carry the bags as status symbols. Some just want to look at them, like art.
Diane D’Amato, who auctions Birkins and Kellys as the director of luxury accessories for Heritage Auctions, said that over the last three to four years she’s been “incredibly busy.” While she expects the original Birkin auction to heighten awareness of the re-sale market, she thinks Trump’s tariffs will drive up demand even further. “It's going to become harder, in my opinion, to move goods internationally,” she said. “You take the chance of [a new bag] getting stuck in customs.”
Prior to joining the auction world, D’Amato worked as a store director for Hermès, selling a limited range of bags. The Heritage boutique carries bags that span many seasons, like a hot pink Birkin priced at $28,000 to a limited edition Kelly with sterling silver going for $130,000. Auctioneers like D’Amato may soon even start selling Labubus, those polarizing Birkin purse charms; a rare version of the doll sold for $170,000 secondhand last month in Beijing. I caught up with her by phone last week to learn more about the wild world of secondhand Birkins.
Tell me about your biggest secondhand bag sales.
At auction, $250,000 for diamond Himalayan Birkin. At the boutique, a sterling silver bijou mini Kelly sold for $175,000. The bag that resonates with me is a metallic Kelly 25 that a client probably bought for $6,000 and we sold for $130,000 quite a few years ago. It just goes to show how the very rare pieces have no ceiling.
You’ve been at your job for 11 years, but you said you’ve seen interest in Birkins really pick up in the last few. What changed?
Years ago, a client would say, “I'd like a black Birkin.” So I would bring out a black Birkin in a couple of different sizes and it wouldn't really matter. Today, they learn about the leathers, the hardware, the date stamps, the colors. People are very specific about what they want. They don't necessarily want the latest bag. They want luxury. And no one does luxury like Hermès.
Why do people buy the bags secondhand? Is it simply because the stores won’t sell them to everyone who wants one, or is there something I’m missing?
I was a store director for many years in Hermès in New Jersey. All the store directors do their own buy for their boutique, and there are many more clients than there are bags available. People always want what they can't have. You also need to really become a client of the house of Hermès to obtain the bag of choice. And even then, you may be offered an etoupe Birkin where you really want a black Birkin. So clients will buy that etoupe Birkin and hope that they get a black Birkin the next time.
Do the bags just go to the highest spenders at the stores?
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