Beauty

Today.

The 1980s marked a new milestone in the Maison’s history: the founder’s son, Phillipe Cassegrain, took over the family business and came up with the idea of ​​collaborating with young and talented designers, and his business sense did not let Longchamp down this time either. Perhaps it’s all about energy — we tend to cult everything that the hand of an obviously talented person touches, and from year to year the company pleases its fans with unusual design novelties in limited editions, whose value only grows with time and with the growing popularity of the authors of these mini masterpieces.

To celebrate Le Pliage’s 10th anniversary in 2004, the company invited controversial British artist and renowned feminist Tracey Emin to collaborate on a special limited edition handbag. Tracy adorned travel bags with declarations of love in various languages, including her native Turkish. In the same 2004, British conceptual architect Thomas Heatherwick, designer of the Rolling Bridge in London, came up with the idea for another bag called «the Zipper bag». One day, the designer was impressed by the fact that zippers are produced in rolls of at least 200 meters and prompted him to make a noteworthy experiment — is it possible to create something miniature and interesting with a zipper of non-standard length? This experiment resulted in a collaboration with Longchamp in the Zipper bag series — two-layer bags with a magnetic closure. The zipper on this bag is located in several rows right along the perimeter. The bag is not only stylish, but also functional – when unzipped, it triples in size in a spiral, revealing a bright inner surface, previously hidden behind a zipper. Such a design find could not fail to become one of the bestsellers, and Heatherwick studios employees received another lucrative contract — to develop the architectural concept and design of the 100th anniversary boutique La Maison Unique store, in New York, 132 Spring Street, SoHo. Zippers, functional and sexy at the same time, keep things closed and hint at something hidden behind their sharp teeth. It was this principle of lightning that the architect applied during the creation of the interior space of the store. Inside the ordinary three-story building-box of 1936, there really is something to see, and even something to be surprised at. The interior of the boutique is a single conceptual world: a labyrinth of flights of stairs leads to a spacious showroom, where shelves for placing models are made in the form of narrow sections, as if detached from the ceiling, creating a kind of angular landscape. Every detail of the interior of the boutique is designed to amaze, invite you to go inside, explore this mysterious world and stay among Longchamp’s fans for a long time, if not forever.

2006 British Vogue’s choice of summer must-haves is Longchamp handbags by influential British designer Jeremy Scott. A catchy travel collection from small bags to roomy suitcases on wheels, stylized as light wood boxes for cargo transportation with characteristic and provocative inscriptions Fragile, Not your bag, Paris made a splash. Yes, they are “not yours” (the series is called This is not your Bag), but the beauty is that they are noticeable, and at the airport you will hardly be able to confuse your luggage with someone else’s — this is a limited edition, one of those that great for collections and only gets better with age. Although no one is safe from incidents, and perhaps the wonderful case with the Fragile inscription on the leather side that you just received in the arrivals hall of the airport of one of the European capitals is not really yours, but belongs to that stylish guy with exactly the same case in his hand … By the way, The Le Pliage’ Summer 2009 collection features a limited edition soft milky The Stomp bag by Jeremy Scott, embellished with a deep print of the grooved soles of men’s boots, in line with stars such as Kylie Minogue and Cameron Diaz. The bag will be incredibly good paired with silk shirt dresses “trampled down” in the same manner by Jeremy Scott again. You can order such a bag only in a London boutique.

These days, the brand is no longer associated with specialty products for smokers, but is known as a manufacturer of fashionable travel accessories, classic men’s briefcases and handbags, partly handcrafted — a mandatory requirement of the Colbert committee, which brings together all French luxury manufacturers such as Hermes, Louis Vuitton, Christian Dior and Chanel. The advertising face of the House for the past four years has been the British top model Kate Moss, who is able to turn any thing she wears into a trend. It was she who inspired the company’s designers to create a new series of women’s bags Legende’. When Kate was asked what her dream bag was, Kate replied that the ultimate desire for her was a roomy doctor-style bag, stylized as 70s black patent leather on the outside, lined in bright scarlet. Her desires became a call to action for the Longchamp design team, and thus a new legend was born, which this and many other famous girls prefer not to part with in everyday life. Bags of this line are also available in 4 sizes and several different combinations of color and leather texture. Legende in the same variant created for Kate Moss costs about 1000 euros, the cost of Legende’s summer bag of 2009 from a combined combination of beige plus cherry or beige plus black is about 600 euros.

Tomorrow.

Now the search for new names on the threshold of world fame and the embodiment of their unrestricted self-expression is an important part of Longchamp’s corporate policy. A special flair for events allowed the company to combine seemingly completely incompatible things. They create a new reality where creators-designers put a part of their soul into their creations, which makes Longchamp bags not just leather goods, but an object of desire. So how do you create a legend? Mix a little experience of previous generations, add a non-trivial appearance, it is desirable to involve a person who promises to become a supernova to participate in the design, limit the release to a batch of 100 to 1000 pieces, spice up the quality factor and functionality traditional for the brand in circulation, always be on the wave of time and surprise The recipe for creating a legend is simple.