The Original Birkin Bag Sells for a Record

The unique and original Birkin bag that fashion house Hermès made for actor and singer Jane Birkin sold for $10.1 million, including fees, at auction in Paris on Thursday. The huge amount blew past what auctioneer Sotheby's had said was the previous record for a handbag, reports the AP. Sketched out on an air sickness bag, the so-called Original Birkin bag became fashion's must-have accessory. The Paris fashion house exclusively commissioned the bag for the London-born star in 1984—branding it with her initials JB on the front flap, below the lock—and delivered the finished one-of-a-kind bag to her the following year. 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 with the then head of Hermès, Jean-Louis Dumas. Birkin recounted in subsequent interviews that the pair got talking after she spilled some of her things on the cabin floor. Birkin asked Dumas why Hermès didn't make a bigger handbag and sketched out on an airplane vomit bag the sort of hold-all that she would like. He then had an example made for her and, flattered, she agreed when Hermès asked whether it could commercialize the bag in her name. "It is incredible to think that a bag initially designed by Hermès as a practical accessory for Jane Birkin has become the most desirable bag in history," said Sotheby's head of handbags and fashion, Morgane Halimi.

The bag became so famous that Birkin once mused before her death in 2023 that her obituaries would likely "say, 'Like the bag' or something." "Well, it could be worse," she added. When Birkin chatted to Hermès' Dumas on the Paris-to-London flight about what her ideal handbag would be, she'd been in the habit of carrying her things around in a wicker basket, because she felt handbags in the 1980s were too small, Sotheby's said. Birkin kept the prototype for nearly 10 years before auctioning it for an AIDS charity in 1994. It was auctioned again in 2000 and has since been in private hands, Sotheby's said.