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Me and my Louis Vuitton
As Louis Vuitton opens its mammoth new London store this week, three devotees tell Kate Salter about their favourite pieces
Anu Mahtani, 37, is the owner and designer of the fashion label, Ananya. She lives in London and Mumbai and owns a collection of Louis Vuitton luggage.
Louis Vuitton has a long history in India. In the early 20th century the maharajas used bespoke Vuitton luggage when they travelled. There are pictures of these amazing cabin trunks, hat boxes, secretaires for shoes and even typewriter and Dictaphone cases. The Maharaja Jagatjit Singh of Kapurthala was a real Francophile and one of Louis Vuitton's biggest patrons. In 1938 his order included a wardrobe.
I've always loved that historical connection. About 20 years ago I found an old Louis Vuitton trunk at Bentleys shop in Walton Street in London and bought it. It's so beautiful that I use it as a decorative piece in my living-room. The label was very difficult to get hold of at the time in India. But in 2003 the first store opened in Delhi and, a year later, one in Mumbai.
Since then it's just grown in popularity. In India people tend to dress up more, especially in Mumbai where there are lots of lunches, parties and social events. Women will spend a lot of money on their accessories and the social set there are really into their labels. Vuitton is a label that has a real cachet there because it's French, it's classic. You know when you're carrying Louis Vuitton it's guaranteed to make a statement.
I love collecting the modern pieces, too – when I was in college I used a Louis Vuitton rucksack! Since then I've bought a leopard-print clutch bag, a Stephen Sprouse graffiti handbag, and a denim handbag.
I also like the luggage – I live mostly in London but I spend five months of the year in India at my house in Mumbai. I own Louis Vuitton suitcases, wheelie bags and washbags, and take them every time I go away. Although I'm not quite up to the maharaja level yet.
Polly Devlin, 66, is a writer and academic. She owns a Louis Vuitton trunk bequeathed to her by the photographer, Cecil Beaton
My Louis Vuitton trunk was given to me by Cecil Beaton. I was a friend of his, although we weren't particularly close. We met when I was features editor at Vogue during the 1960s. Cecil Beaton had a great many treasures but one of the things I most admired was this wonderful Louis Vuitton trunk. I think he was quite amused at me liking it so much. I knew Louis Vuitton was smart, but it didn't have the same luxurious connotations it does today. In fact, although I worked on Vogue, I knew very little about fashion. What I loved about this trunk was its livery, a blue and white stripe down the centre, with a monogrammed CB to distinguish it from every other upper-class person travelling with their Vuitton trunk.
After Beaton died someone called Sam Green, who was an art dealer and John Lennon's art adviser, got in touch to say Cecil had wanted me to have the trunk. I've had it ever since and watched it rise to become a piece of iconography.
It has a lovely history: it had originally belonged to the Duchess of Marlborough, Consuelo Vanderbilt. Consuelo Vanderbilt was the richest woman in America, and was married off completely against her will by her dreadfully social-climbing mother to the Duke of Marlborough. She was miserable and eventually left him after many years of great unhappiness, and ran away with a Frenchman called Jacques Balsan, whom she married in 1921. She became more or less a commoner with the initials CB, and I imagine the trunk was part of her wedding trousseau. She eventually gave it to Cecil Beaton.
The trunk lives in my apartment in Paris. When I travel I use another piece of Louis Vuitton luggage – a small wheelie suitcase, which you can take on board aeroplanes. It's exquisitely made and organised so cleverly with a place for your phone and your passport. It is a Mon Monogram case, so it has the same blue and white stripe as the Cecil Beaton trunk, and my initials, PDG, on it.
But the thing I love most about it is the image it gives me when I'm in Paris – one that's actually completely alien to me. When I'm on the Métro with it I see people, especially young women, who gaze wonderingly at the bag with all it implies and then look at me and think, 'She's stolen that bag from somebody – that can't be hers!'
Bay Garnett, 36, is Polly Devlin's daughter and a stylist. She is a contributing editor at Vogue and has a collection of Louis Vuitton's scarves
My mother's Louis Vuitton trunk was in the drawing-room of our house when I was little. It always looked glamorous and I knew it had a special story. I used to hide behind it when we played hide and seek!
When Marc Jacobs [Louis Vuitton's creative director] first used the designer Stephen Sprouse's graffiti images for accessories, I fell in love with the scarves instantly. I've always been a scarf person. I like the feeling of something around my neck. I'm also mad about my other Vuitton scarves, a khaki camouflage one by Takashi Murakami, and a blue and white heritage print from the current collection. I wear one of them every day. They are very light cashmere, so soft but warm.
I don't collect the scarves because they're Louis Vuitton; I just love them. There are some beautiful ones coming out next season that look as if they've been spray-painted. But I wear my old ones so much they're like old friends. And just as new friends are nice to find, you don't need them if your old ones are perfect as they are.
Kristin Knox, 24, is a fashion writer and blogger. She grew up in New York but now lives in London with her pet Pomeranian dog, Butters, which she carries in a Louis Vuitton Neverfull bag
I began putting Butters in my Louis Vuitton Neverfull bag for convenience's sake. Carrying a dog around in a Louis Vuitton bag is a bit of a cliché in some circles, but it really was for purely practical reasons. Butters was eight weeks old when I first bought her, but couldn't be vaccinated until she was four months. You can't let an unvaccinated dog roam the streets of Manhattan or God knows what they'll pick up. So for two months I carried her everywhere.
I'd bought the Neverfull at the Louis Vuitton store on Fifth Avenue without thinking of Butters. I'd started seeing these young girls everywhere in downtown New York carrying the same bag. It's monogrammed canvas with a striking striped lining that I thought was really cool. I liked the way people were tying their scarves to them to accessorise. At around £400 it was also cheaper than other Louis Vuitton bags, and that opened it up to a new demographic.
It was when I got the bag home that I realised that, because of its size and the length of the straps, it was perfect for my dog. Of all the bags I own it's the most comfortable for her to travel in. I can fit my camera, my laptop and everything else without crushing her. It's so well made that I can load it up, give it a bit of a beating, and, unlike some other bags I've had, it won't break.
Before this I owned a Messenger bag that was my mother's, a small Speedy bag, and a denim purse I was given as a little girl. But it wasn't until I saw the Neverfull bag that I thought the label was cool again. Butters does travel in other types of bags but the Louis is the favourite.
I was right after all. Thank you, you 2 for the confirmation 