It’s already 81 degrees in Paris, but across 10 heated minutes inside Sotheby’s auction house, temperatures, heart rates, and auction records spike. Today Jane Birkin’s original Hermès Birkin is up for sale in its first market appearance in 25 years.
I hop off the Eurostar from a sweltering London and into the brutal heat of Paris, the city also thick with the fug of Couture Week. It’s a season defined by designer musical chairs and highly anticipated debuts: Demna’s final Balenciaga show before his Gucci move, Glenn Martens’s Margiela debut, Michael Rider’s first showing for Celine. But today is about an enduring symbol from a luxury house that stretches beyond fashion and into the realm of pop culture phenomena, as closely affiliated with Sex and the City and the voracious collecting habits of the Kardashians as it is with the late Birkin herself, who passed away in 2023.
The Birkin bag was made for the British-French actor and singer in 1984, after she met Hermès executive Jean-Louis Dumas on an airplane that same year. Frustrated with her overfilled wicker baskets, she told Dumas she needed a bag that would work with her always-on-the-go life. As Birkin herself told Vogue while sitting front row at the Hermès fall 2012 show: “I think I drew it on the sick bag—or the not-be-sick bag. And [Dumas] said, ‘I’ll make it for you.’” They devised the bag with two rolled handles, a flap top, clou “feet,” and a lock closure: practical, elegant, and a design mostly unchanged today.
Birkin donated the original handbag in 1994 to benefit Association Solidarité Sida, the French AIDS charity. Paris-based collector and vintage-store owner Catherine Benier purchased it again in 2000. The original Birkin bag has been on something of a world tour since its auction announcement, exhibited publicly for the first time across Europe, as well as in Hong Kong and New York.
The route I take to see the purse at today’s auction is one Birkin herself knew well; she regularly traveled from her home in London’s Chelsea to St. Pancras International and then under the channel to Paris. (On my two-hour journey, I even leaf through a copy of Metropolitan, the Eurostar magazine Birkin once wrote for.)
Arriving at Sotheby’s on Paris’s ritzy Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, press and collectors are gathering in groups. Gossip swirls that Kris Jenner and Lauren Sánchez Bezos will be on the phone lines. Attendees tote Birkin purses of all shapes and sizes, with a smattering of Kellys. Some linger around the glass box beside the auctioneer podium where the prototype Birkin bag sits. It is black with gold hardware, the same width as the current Birkin 35 but with the depth of the Birkin 40. It also features the initials of its original owner, J.B., on the front flap. It is scuffed and stained, with discoloration from stickers for UNICEF and Médecins du Monde. Some small silver nail clippers are attached to the shoulder strap because Birkin liked to keep her nails neatly trimmed. It is a little emotional to see these intimate touches but also a little disorientating, knowing the gargantuan prices this well-worn, well-loved piece will reach.
At 4 p.m. sharp, the auction begins. “Much more than a simple bag, the Birkin has evolved from a simple accessory to a timeless cultural icon,” the auctioneer tells the room. The bag is Lot 8, and only preregistered clients are allowed to bid; they hold the premium white paddles and sit in the two front rows. We start with an Azzedine Alaïa black lambskin ensemble from the fall 1983 collection, which sells for $3,200. Next, a draped black dress embroidered with hummingbirds from Alexander McQueen’s resort 2008 collection, then more Alaïa, and Vivienne Westwood. Conservation hums softly, rising as we get closer to Lot 8. Finally, we’re there.
Across 10 minutes, paddles rise at speed and hands shoot up from the phone bank. Bidding opens at €1 million ($1.7 million) to loud gasps; that single bid broke the previous world record for a handbag sold at auction, set in 2021 by the Hermès White Himalaya Niloticus Crocodile Diamond Retourne Kelly 28, which went for $513,040. Nine collectors emerge across the phones, online, and in the room in a manic exchange of bids. Eventually, the gavel comes down on a hammer price of €7 million ($8.2 million). After the fees and buyer’s premium, the final price is a staggering €8.6 million ($10.1 million). The bag was sold to a private collector from Japan, who bid via telephone through Maiko Ichikawa, the head of Sotheby’s in Japan.
“The spectacular sale of the original Hermès Birkin today…is a startling demonstration of the power of a legend and its capacity to ignite the passion and desire of collectors seeking exceptional items with unique provenance, to own its origin,” says Morgane Halimi, Sotheby’s global head of handbags and fashion.
“I am astonished at the result, but, as a passionate collector myself, I am first and foremost profoundly moved by the way other collectors have invested so much fervor in trying to acquire what they clearly desired beyond words,” Benier, the seller of the Birkin, says. “It made me relive my own bidding battle, 25 years ago, and how raw and indescribable the feeling of winning over this wonderful bag was. I’m already very nostalgic at the thought of knowing the bag is no longer mine but extremely happy it has found a new loving home. I wish the new owner as much happiness as I experienced with it.”
“It is very difficult to imagine my life without this Birkin bag, but I am happy,” Benier tells Vogue after the auction, holding a bouquet of pink and white flowers.
The day’s auction continues on, with more McQueen and some Galliano, but most of the attendees begin to filter out and chat excitedly. Shushes from staff go unacknowledged.
“I came from London to bid on Jane Birkin’s Birkin,” Hanushka Toni—the CEO of Sellier, a UK-based curated luxury resale platform—tells Vogue. “Hermès are our bread and butter. I had a suspicion this would be the most expensive bag ever sold at auction, and I was proven right. I went up to 2 million euros. I thought people would tap out at 5 million. Going up to 7 million…shocking, but not shocking!”
“We’ve been doing Hermès for over six years, and the demand just continues to grow,” she adds. “Now that everyone has the commercial models like the Birkin 25s that you can buy from resellers, people with actual wealth want these one-of-a-kind, special bags. This bag has only been auctioned off once or maybe twice in my lifetime. It was important for me to be here. Who knows if I’ll have the chance to own it again!”
Toni isn’t the only handbag obsessive to have made the pilgrimage to Paris for the event. “This is my Super Bowl,” says Dana Auslander, CEO and founder of wealth tech company Luxus, who has traveled from New York specially for the auction. Her company launched an Hermès-focused fund in May. “I was hoping it would get $1 million because that would validate my investments, but for it to go for what it did…it’s mind-blowing.” She’s toting a burnt orange Birkin 35, out of which a copy of It Girl: The Life and Legacy of Jane Birkin by Marisa Meltzer peeks.
Today has also been an opportunity for Auslander to link up with her friend Sara Abou-Khalil, a client of Sotheby’s based between Paris and Dubai and a collector of contemporary art. “I’ve been telling people to invest in Hermès bags for years!” Abou-Khalil says.
“It’s a real moment for the power of women consumers and collectibles for women,” adds Auslander. “I’ve had to watch car sales, watch sales, and all the other man toys…. For this to have generated that kind of price is really exciting. We’re showing the purchasing power of women. I come from a family of collectors, and I believe when you’re spending this kind of money, it’s good to know it’s money well spent. It adds to the appeal of this brand.”
“Women are usually more conservative when they spend money, so for a piece linked to a woman like Jane Birkin, it really speaks to the value we add in this world,” Auslander says. “I would love this bag to be donated to the Costume Institute, where I think it belongs. I want to make sure these collectibles are revered and collected in the same way art is. They’re not right now. They’re looked upon as consumer goods. A bag fetching such a price, as the ultimate consumer good, really, is monumental.”
“The ultimate female consumer good!” adds Abou-Khalil.
Now, Abou-Khalil and Auslander intend to go for a drink and catch up. “Hermès has brought us together again,” says Auslander.
“And we’ll of course go by the Hermès store,” adds Abou-Khalil.
“This is the bag that made Hermès what it is today,” a tuxedo-wearing, Hermès Hac a Dos–carrying Daniel Wesson tells Vogue. “This is about owning a piece of history.” He’s known as the Birkin Junky and runs the Hermès-dedicated luxury consignment and sourcing platform Luxe Junky. He, too, traveled from the US—Miami, to be precise—for today’s auction but tapped out at $2.2 million. “I thought it was going to go for less than that,” he says. “Much less. We’re surprised!” (He’s shocked Hermès didn’t bid on the bag, either.) The Luxe Junky collection currently stands at seven Birkin bags. “It’s very small compared to others here, but we curate these bags all the time. We help clients find these bags. We rehome them. I don’t like to say sell! We find them a new place to live their best life.”
Still, he’s feeling “very sad” having lost out. “I’m going to go have a couple of drinks,” says Wesson. “I was really hoping to take it home. I heard it was sold to somebody in Japan. Congratulations to them! I’ll be in Tokyo in April, so let’s do a bag tour.”
Stepping out into the early evening air in Paris, the atmosphere is electric. Birkins of all colors head their separate ways for commiserative drinks and community catchups, while I head back toward the Gare du Nord station for the Eurostar back to Birkin’s home country—my own over-stuffed non-Birkin (it’s from Belle the Label) clinking with jars of French mustard and pâté.
