A bag, Birkinified: clad in charms, keychains and ribbons, a young woman flaunts her newly on-trend Prada tote in front of the camera, zooming in on each kitschy, personal addition. Newly outfitted in the fripperies of individuality, the bag’s adornments act much like a luggage tag at the airport – functionally distinctive, but also a possible creative extension of self. THIS IS ME, it seems to say, AND I AM FABULOUS!
In this case, the Prada bag is captured on TikTok, the wonderful and wearying workshop of all trends today. The Birkinification craze derives from the ‘trinkifying’ trend where people (primarily young women) personalize their bags in the manner of fashion icon Jane Birkin. Swinging 1960s It-girl, singer and actress, the tale of Birkin’s eponymous bag is entrenched in fashion history: on a flight to London in 1981, she unknowingly found herself sat beside the Hermès executive and visionary Jean-Louis Dumas. When her belongings spilled out of her bag upon putting it in an overhead compartment, he declared that he would make her a new one. Strolling up later to Hermès to collect her custom-made order, Birkin was then asked if she would give her name to the bag in return for an annual fee, which she donates to charity. Hence, the world’s arguably most famous (and unarguably most expensive) bag was born.
Birkin’s Birkin is always smattered with stickers, charms and tags. However, the joyous thing about Birkinification is that you don’t need the probably-more-than-£100,000 Hermès to emulate the look. Of course, there are high-end iterations (as seen on the Miu Miu SS24 runway) but, as Fiorelli designer Nia Davis has stated, any bag will do. As long as the manner of decoration resonates with that of Birkin – chaotic, fun, personal – then anyone can get in on Birkinification.
Yet in this sense the trend undermines itself: anyone who wants to try Birkinification does, decorating their bag in a way that is supposed to conjure their own individuality, but in the end merely confines them to the herd-mentality nature of a trend. Supposedly, the adornments create a distinct shorthand of trinkets that evoke your personality alone – but how can this be so when the way of expressing it is a template? Whilst striving for individual distinction, you are also modelling yourself on Birkin’s originality, thereby consigning yourself to a group in which no individual besides Birkin is relevant. This is even more emphatic when Birkinification becomes subject to any TikTok core currently residing in coreville. ‘Coquettecore’ and ‘balletcore’ have both inflicted themselves on Birkinification, meaning that, in reality, the unique personal objects which adorn these bags turn out to all be the same. Lace, pink ribbon and pearl chains… who can see where the trends stop and the individual begins?
Birkinification may masquerade behind the premise of individuality, but – all the above being said – it is certainly good fun. To decorate and make the bag your own: there is something endearingly childish about it,. having somewhat strayed from Birkin’s style as the inspiration source, Birkinification shows how trends are themselves subject to trends, and how fashion icons are eclipsed by the fashions they pioneer. At the end of it all, you might lose your individuality to the trend – but hopefully you’ll still know which bag is yours.
