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We all know the scene. Sarah Jessica Parker’s Carrie Bradshaw is lost somewhere south of Houston Street when an armed gunman asks for her Manolo Blahniks and her bag. Before handing it over, Bradshaw bravely corrects her mugger: “It’s a Baguette.” And the rest is history. The style, which was debuted by Silvia Venturini Fendi in 1997, was dubbed the Baguette after the way it sits like, say, a particular French bread under the arm when carried. Soon, the accessory came to be known as an It bag, one which fashion historians cite as the first-ever. That was a quarter of a century ago, and to celebrate the milestone today, a slew of new, limited-edition 25th-anniversary Baguette bags have arrived fresh from the Fendi boulangerie.
“It was a special day when I designed this bag; the stars aligned. The horoscope said it was a Fendi day,” Silvia Venturini Fendi, artistic director of accessories and menswear at Fendi, says in a press release announcing the latest batch of 25 re-editioned baguettes which will be shoppable today on Fendi.com and at a special pop-up shop opening today in Manhattan.
As these handbags are re-editions, some might look familiar, especially since a selection was seen at Fendi’s last show, which was designed in collaboration with Fendi’s artistic director of womenswear Kim Jones and Marc Jacobs in maison-mishmash. “Marc is one of my heroes, the reason I am here,” Jones told Vogue in the October issue, referencing the fact that it was Jacobs who hired Jones to do menswear at Louis Vuitton once upon a time.
And because this is such a big birthday for Fendi, the celebrations come in many parts. In addition to today’s launch of 25 re-editions, there will be more collaborations dropping throughout the rest of the year. Bags designed by Porter, Sarah Jessica Parker, Tiffany & Co, and Marc Jacobs will follow.
“I tried to think about what Fendi meant to me—I thought back to Karl and the late ’70s, and then I thought about, What is Fendi today? I took a look at what Kim is doing, and the Baguettes, put it all together, and finally I decided to stop overanalyzing it and just have fun with it,” Jacobs told Vogue.
Shop the 25 re-editions below.
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