Karen Solomon 9/14/25 Karen Solomon 9/14/25

Workin’ Girl’s Birkin

How to accessorize your handbag like Jane Birkin did with her iconic eponymous Birkin bag, with bag charms and bag chains.

Jane Birkin smiling, holding her iconic original Birkin bag with charms and stickers on it, stuffed with her things

It sold for $10,000,000. And had stickers on it. And maybe an old banana at the bottom. But Jane Birkin’s bag, the OG iconic and very first IT BAG is relentlessly knocked off because it is well, perfect. Yet hers looks anything but. What’s most curious about seeing images of her bag, is how lived in it was. Like it was a VW bus that she traveled cross country in. It wasn’t precious, nor kept in a dustbag on a shelf waiting for a special occasion, it was part of her daily life, an extension of her. It was decorated, fun, stuffed with things she deemed important and became part of her personality. When I worked at MTV, I used to refer to my Mulberry Bayswater bag as the workin’ girl’s Birkin, a title seconded by my makeup artist friend there and resident handbag guru, Sheree. So no matter what bag you carry, dress it up and make it your own with these bits and bobs and beads, Birkin style.