In the workshops of Paris, a quiet lineage stretched from the medieval girdle pouch, worn on a belt through the lanes of the old city, to the sculpted leather shapes of houses like Polène, Fleuron, Le Tanneur, and RSVP Paris. Across eight centuries the handbag changed with the city itself, shaped by court fashion at Versailles, the reticules of the Revolution, the department stores of the Belle Époque, and the ateliers that made Paris the capital of style. What remained was a craft passed hand to hand, stitch by stitch, and a small object that carried the history of France wherever it went.
