A handbag sold for 8.6 million euros (7.4 million pounds sterling) – becoming the most precious ever sold at auction.
Orginal Hermes Birkin, who had belonged and had been appointed British actor and singer Jane Birkin, passed Thursday at the hammer in Sotheby’s in Paris.
It is also the second most expensive fashion article ever sold.
British actress and singer Jane Birkin. Pic: AP
The bag was designed for Birkin, who played in a number of French and British films from the 1960s before his death in 2023.
She was sitting next to Jean-Louis Dumas, then artistic director of Hermes, on an Air France flight in 1981.
Bearing all her articles in a wicker basket, she complained to Dumas that the handbags available at the time were too small to adapt to all her personal effects.
Pic: Reuters
The pair began to draw drawings at the back of a sick bag, and in 1985, Hermes had produced a prototype and presented it to Birkin, asking him permission to name the new style in his honor.
He has since become a symbol of status, carried by celebrities such as Kate Moss, Victoria Beckham, Khloe Kardashian and Jennifer Lopez.
Morgane Halimi, a global manager of handbag and Sotheby fashion, said: “The spectacular sale of the original Hermes Birkin today in Paris of Sotheby marks an important step in the history of fashion and the luxury industry more widely.
Khloe Kardashian with a Birkin Crocodile bag. Pic: AP
“This is a surprising demonstration of the power of a legend and its ability to ignite the passion and the desire of collectors in search of exceptional objects with a unique origin, to have its origin.”
The previous world record for a handbag was the Hermès White Himalaya Niloticus Crocodile Diamond returns Kelly 28, which sold in 2021 for $ 513,040 (£ 380,000).
The most expensive fashion article ever sold was the pair of Ruby red slippers worn by Judy Garland in the film The Wizard of Oz, which brought in $ 32.5 million (24 million pounds sterling) in 2024.