Each of these iconic handbags is made from start to finish by one skilled artisan, with 15 to 24 hours of pure handwork.
Luxury fashion has long been synonymous with Hermès, the French fashion powerhouse globally famous for its coveted Birkin bag. This bag has become a dream possession of fashion aficionados and collectors because of its exceptional craftsmanship, premium materials, and limited availability—not to mention its status symbol.
Birkin bags retail for around USD9,000 (PHP530,000) and the most expensive one by far—the Diamond Himalaya Birkin—can fetch as much as USD450,000 (PHP4.6 million) at auctions. Still and all, Hermès heir and artistic director Pierre-Alexis Dumas thinks that they are “not expensive.” Instead, they are “costly.”
He explained the difference in an interview with CBS News’ TV program 60 Minutes. He told correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi, “I’ve always heard that Hermès is very expensive. It’s not expensive. It’s costly.”
“The cost is the actual price of making an object properly with the required level of attention so that you have an object of quality,” he continued. “Expensive is a product which is not delivering what it’s supposed to deliver, but you’ve paid quite a large amount of money for it, and then it betrays you. That’s expensive.”
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Producing high-quality products—from its famed Birkin and Kelly bags to ready-to-wear clothing and home accessories—is at the core of Hermès since Dumas’ great-great-great grandfather, Thierry Hermès, founded the brand in Paris in 1837. It was, in fact, what inspired Dumas’ father, Jean-Louis, to create the Birkin bag in 1984.
Dumas said that the idea suddenly came to mind when his father was seated next to British actress Jane Birkin on a flight to London. His father recalled her saying, “Well, let me tell you, I’m not happy about my bag. I want something more loose with bigger handles, and ease—and always open when I carry it.”
Dumas said his father was good at sketching, that’s why illustrating the idea of a bag that would suit the liking of the actress—and that of many women in the following decades—seemed a no-brainer for him.
“A bit something like that?” Dumas quoted his father as saying, as he showed the sketch to the actress. And she replied, “Yeah, that would be great.”
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In true Hermès fashion, each Birkin bag is crafted not only with functional aesthetic but more so with extremely fine and delicate workmanship. Each of these iconic handbags is made from start to finish by one skilled artisan at a glacial pace. Its release in stores is something of a rarity, and customers wait years to get their hands on a Birkin, or any other handbag for that matter, from the luxury brand. Online chatter warns of six-year waits, according to the Telegraph.
A great deal of money is a given criterion for purchasing the bag. But if one badly wants to get their hands on them, the key is to have patience, patience, and more patience. As Dumas said, “Eventually, it’s gonna happen.”
“Well, you have to walk in a Hermès store, and uh—you have to be patient,” he began explaining. “I’m saying it’s a long process. You go to a store. You get an appointment. You meet a salesperson. You talk about what you want. It’s not available. You’ll have to wait. They’ll come back to you. It takes a long time. Eventually, it’s gonna happen.”
Many speculate that the years-long wait is a marketing strategy to keep customers hungry for the bags and pump up demand. Dumas went on to shut down the rumor and explained that the release of their bags depends on how intricately they are made and the number of artisans working on them.
He said, “It makes me smile that this is a diabolical marketing idea that can only come out of people obsessed with marketing. But we don’t have a marketing department at Hermès. So first of all, when I heard that, I was like, ‘What? Oh. Okay. I get it. Yeah, well, no. Whatever we have, we put on the shelf, and it goes.”
Dumas added that building something timeless takes time. Hermès strongly lived by this belief in the last 200 years which, in turn, made them the second most valuable luxury brand in the world in 2023, next to Louis Vuitton.
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“We’re about craft. We’re not machines,” Dumas continued. “And we are not compromising on the quality of the way we make the bags. So, if the craftsperson is not at the level, his or her bag would not go to the store.”
The long wait and steep prices are reflections of the level of quality guaranteed with every Hermès product. Each handbag is made of premium materials that embody the brand’s reputation, from the leather that comes in over 200 different shades to the hardware elements which usually are normally made from brass with gold or silver plating.
It would usually take a craftsman 15 to 24 hours of handwork to complete a bag. They are made with strict and rigorous practices, including mastering Hermès signature “saddle stitch”—a skill required of every artisan working in the brand’s leather workshops. It is one of the many techniques they must master during their year-long apprenticeship at the company’s leather school, École Hermès des savoir-faire.
The entire process, from training its artisans to crafting the bags themselves, may be long and tedious, but speeding things up has never been an option for the luxury brand. “Immediate satisfaction,” Dumas said, is not what Hermès is about.
“Well, speed is the structuring value of the 20th century. We went from horse carriages to the internet. Are we going to be obsessed with speed and immediate satisfaction? Maybe not,” he said. “Maybe there is another form of relation to the world, which is linked to patience—to taking the time of making things right. You cannot compress time, at one point, without compromising on quality.”
Watch the full interview below.
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