PARIS — Sketched out on an airplane vomit sack, it became fashion’s must-have accessory.
The original Birkin bag, named after the actor, singer and fashion icon that Hermès created it for – the late Jane Birkin – is up for auction in Paris on Thursday.
The so-called Original Birkin is expected to fetch hundreds of thousands of euros (dollars) at the sale by Sotheby’s.
The Paris fashion house exclusively commissioned the bag for the London-born star in 1984 – branding it with her initials J.B on the front flap, below the lock – and delivered the finished one-of-a-kind bag to her the following year, the auction house said. The subsequent commercialized version of Birkin’s bag went on to become one of the world’s most exclusive luxury items, extravagantly priced and with a years-long waiting list.
The bag was born of a fortuitous encounter on a London-bound flight in the 1980s