Two Things

Tote bags and fashion documentaries

Welcome to my occasional, when-I-feel-like-it bonus content about secondhand shopping and selling, minor fascinations, passing fancies, and old stuff! This is the same subscription as Just Some Lady and you are (obviously!) free to skip it.

I’m certainly not the person to consult about Today’s Fashion Trends, but I did notice a few things whilst walking around Paris (I promise I will soon cease being a “well in Paris” wanker, but admittedly there was a lot of content in that trip) that I felt compelled to note here.

First and foremost, most people just look Regular. That’s because they are Regular: they are going to work or school or whatever, just Parisian-ly (aka they are being absolutely terrifying on a bicycle they rented through an app). Many times we seemed to find ourselves walking behind a reassuringly sturdy avocat, a word that in French means both avocado and lawyer, and it is up to you and the context clues which one is correct. In our case, it was the latter, and these Parisian dads seemed to be always clad in a very well-cut navy overcoat, swinging a shopping bag and one-shouldering a backpack, talking animatedly to their spouse on Bluetooth earbuds about le dîner or something happening at a child’s école. I liked observing this slice of daily life, these dads on their way home having stopped for something at the Monoprix and checking in with HQ. (We saw a lot of non-toxic male energy in France, notably at restaurants, but that is a topic for another day.)

Anyway I obviously paid more attention to the women and what they were wearing because I am always just sort of shopping, and the streets were like a fashion magazine come to life. This won’t be surprising to a lot of you, but all the cool-looking women in Paris were wearing wide-legged jeans, white sneakers, and slouchy leather jackets. This isn’t a look I’m sure I can pull off myself, but I like it a lot, and it was all but ubiquitous, as were voluminous trench coats, silk scarves, and very nice handbags. Parisian women in general seemed to be more bundled up than I would have expected for a sunny, 60-degree morning, but I guess if your primary mode of transport is walking, you want to be prepared.

But, because serious fashion discussion is best left to other Substackers, I want to talk about tote bags. People in Paris have their tote bag game on lock, and if you’re a person who has collected many bookstore totes and magazine giveaway totes over the years, this is your time to shine, because anything goes. Popular choices range from the reusable Monoprix bags I mentioned last time to New Yorker and Shakespeare & Company canvas totes to big Dior and Marc Jacobs versions. On our last trip there, I took my Strictly For Men tote bag, a gift from some coworkers about 20 years ago:

In action on the Canal Saint-Martin in 2023.

You can buy this tote bag on eBay, FYI!

This time I took my lady-with-a-cocktail bag from Love & Victory via my best friend Sally, ideal for porting your ham sandwiches and bottles of Perrier to a park:

This was in Square du Temple and I think about this sandwich every single day.

I also threw in a big blue and white striped canvas tote I got free with a Vogue digital subscription I cancelled after one month. By the time the tote arrived I had already forgotten about it, but I cannot deny the size was right for a day of shopping.

There are many bad tote bags on eBay (I found a lot from Draper James and from a “Christian streetwear” brand that I shall not link here), but I stand by my old post on Esprit totes and LeBag, plus I think a good rule of thumb is just to find the weirdest thing possible, for instance this Sandra Boynton number:

Or this cute vintage Switzerland souvenir:

This 1979 Kellogg’s tote isn’t in the greatest condition but it is very appealing to me and the bidding starts at 99 cents:

Or perhaps you’re a horse girl:

Finally, here’s a very inexpensive LeBag in decent nick:

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The other thing I want to natter about this week is fashion documentaries. I’m waiting to watch Marc by Sofia even though my favorite podcast gave it a – well, not a lukewarm review exactly but not a rave, either – and I recently watched McQueen (a good documentary but ultimately really sad, of course), Valentino: The Last Emperor (full of famous people, a lot of fed-up Italian arguing) and Catwalk (very of-an-era, focuses on Christy Turlington’s SS94 runway season).

Valentino is really remarkable (there’s a good, and very recent, essay by the filmmaker linked above) because it is not even 20 years old and yet really documents the end of how high fashion operated for most of the 20th century. Valentino Garavani died, at 93 (!!!), only at the beginning of this year, so it seems a particularly good time to watch.

If you want to continue exploring this bygone world, though, I really recommend Catwalk, especially if you have a lot of 90s nostalgia. Catwalk didn’t get great reviews when it was released, but it’s a nice trip back in time, and will have you marveling at how 20-year-old Kate Moss looks about 14. The full movie is available on YouTube, a lot of it is in black and white, everyone is smoking, Karl Lagerfeld is still in his plus size era. It’s Galliano pre-controversy, Carla Bruni pre-first lady of France, Anna Wintour pre-sunglasses.

Next on my list is Unzipped, which I’ll probably have to buy on DVD, speaking of nostalgia.

Finally, I will leave you with the one thing I’ve learned watching fashion documentaries over the years: