The mini bag trend is nowhere near to running out of steam. That means the inspirational ideas are still coming thick and fast from the luxury sector that has the budgets and the explicit permission from it customers to play around with new ideas and different materials and shapes.
Not that this is a category where innovation as such is the overriding theme. In fact, there’s a huge dose of tradition in the mini bags arena, mixed in with a touch of fun (let’s face it, they’re far from the functional workhorses that giant carryalls are).
So this pre-season, we get a focus on handles - long cross-body chains, beaded chains or heavier webbing straps, as well as the tiny handles through which you can barely put your hand but which lend themselves beautifully to occasion/evening bags and get us away from the dominant box clutches and envelope clutches of recent seasons.
Labels play with shape, stretching out their bags into long, slim silhouettes, wide, shallow silhouettes, cubes and discs, as well as scaled-down versions of classic handbags.
Cross-body mini bags are worn high (in some cases virtually butting up against the underarm but more often above waist level). And if the mini bag is small enough it can even be worn slung from a belt.
Of course, these bags make the most of colour and decoration as they can’t rely on vast expanses of the world’s most beautiful leather for their appeal. Hence almost complete absence of mini bags in plain black. Instead, the season’s blues, reds, corals, pinks, yellows and greens are are mixed and matched or made to play a supporting role to geometric patterns, delicate embroideries and appliqués or floral prints.
Image credits, clockwise from left: Delpozo, Red Valentino, Emporia Armani, DSquared, Andrew Gn, Andrew Gn, Versace, Elie Saab, Elie Saab
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