Our Q&A With Jane Birkin & Lou Doillon (Including The Story Of How The Hermes Birkin Bag Came To Be!)
Oh, sure, Jane Birkin and Lou Doillon are style icons with a highfalutin pedigree. (Jane—who inspired the Hermes Birkin bag—is a singer who’s best known as Serge Gainsbourg’s muse, and Lou is a model and generally cool girl.) But around the Christmas tree, they’re just mother and daughter. Here, the beauties talk clothes, family and what they love about each other.
Jane: What’s your earliest memory of my style? Say something funny.
Lou: There was this rumor when I was in kindergarten that you wore dungarees with nothing under. I knew that you must have had a peculiar style to have children talking about it!
Jane: I remember something that’s very distinctive about Lou and her style. When she was around 13, I took her to a shop and said, “Do you want a pair of little trousers, or do you want the pink dress?” And she said, “Would it be very expensive to have them both?” And I said, “No, actually, it wouldn’t.” And to everyone’s surprise, she put on the trousers and then she put the dress on top, and the lady in the shop was so knocked out, she said, “Can I use that as a window design?”
Lou: I never followed trends that much because I never felt like I fit in. I guess I was always a bit jealous of other girls’ styles, and so I just tried to make one for me. Anyway, how many Birkin bags do you own?
Jane: One, because when they get really old and battered, I sell them for charity.
Lou: Tell us the story of the Birkin bag.
Jane: I was sitting next to this man on a plane and looking through my agenda when everything fell on the floor, and he said, “You should have pockets in your agenda. I’m Monsieur Dumas of Hermes. Give me your agenda, and I’ll have pockets put in it.” I gave it to him, and then I said, “Why don’t you make a handbag that’s a bit smaller than your suitcase but big enough to throw things into?” He was good on his word, and when I came back from Paris, my agenda had pockets, and he asked if I would mind if he named a new Hermes bag after me.
Lou: I went to this party once, and somebody said, “Look, it’s the daughter of the bag.” I couldn’t believe it!
Jane: Are there any family traditions that you loved growing up?
Lou: Christmas is a very magical time for us. Even if it sounds really corny.
Jane: We’ve spent it camping in America, or in Wales. It’s really about being together—doesn’t really matter where you are, actually.
![1103-01_jane-birkin-lou-doillon-juan-heredia_li.jpg 1103-01_jane-birkin-lou-doillon-juan-heredia_li.jpg](https://thefashionspot-data.community.forum/attachments/994/994953-7caf86b94fad116dacd9775f20653638.jpg?hash=fK-GuU-tEW)
![1103-03_lou-doillon-juan-heredia_li.jpg 1103-03_lou-doillon-juan-heredia_li.jpg](https://thefashionspot-data.community.forum/attachments/994/994957-b66ee7e178414504c248b236885cd5e4.jpg?hash=tm7n4XhBRQ)
![1103-05_lou-doillon-juan-heredia_li.jpg 1103-05_lou-doillon-juan-heredia_li.jpg](https://thefashionspot-data.community.forum/attachments/994/994961-c72493e64f0b994e2dd4d9bbc544ee4e.jpg?hash=xyST5k8LmU)
![1103-09_lou-doillon-marlowe_li.jpg 1103-09_lou-doillon-marlowe_li.jpg](https://thefashionspot-data.community.forum/attachments/994/994965-4d791805daeff82ca1e06c95cba0778a.jpg?hash=TXkYBdrv-C)
![1103-11_lou-doillon-juan-heredia_li.jpg 1103-11_lou-doillon-juan-heredia_li.jpg](https://thefashionspot-data.community.forum/attachments/994/994967-ffc2c05def0cf69d84c3c40d4cc0ca9f.jpg?hash=_8LAXe8M9p)
glamour.com
bigger scans
here