Magnetic bag closures?

Vmode

Vmode

Registered Guest
Hi guys,

I was just wondering if anyone knows roughly when magnetic purse/handbag closure fastenings were invented? Or at least became widely used!

Thanks all,
Ava
 
Somewhere WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY back in on these boards is a discussion about this. I remember I found one with a patent number on it and looked it up. I believe the patent number was from 1978 but I don't remember exactly. now, how does one search for that thread....
 
One more funny coincidence. I had a second look at a really cool handbag my friend got for me at a charity shop. It has a magnetic clasp - which made me think of this thread :). Checking the clasp, which I haven't done before, I noticed it has a UK patent number on it, so off I went to check on that too. Application Art Laboratories, who filed the patent in '74 in the US, did the same thing in the UK in '75 - you can see it here: http://www.ipo.gov.uk/d-find-number?csbdesign=973682 . Ah, what would I do without this forum!

Karin
 
This thread is very helpful.

Thankyou!!!

I just bought a purple Bally of Switzerland "snakeskin leather" bag from eBay and picked it up in person.

Was sceptical about the "snakeskin" part because nowadays bags made from PVC or similar are passed off as that, when they merely have the print and impression of it. And "snakeskin leather"? Ok I thought, at least it's leather if it's truly a Bally.

So I was thrilled and amazed when I got it home and gave it closer scrutiny that indeed I have a snakeskin bag!

I can tell from the scales and the feeling of their having a direction. The bag is made up of pelts that are stitched vertically. You can see the variation in the size of the scales going from each edge.

It's rather heavy but this is mainly the handles and hardware. I was thinking it's a 1980s style possibly earlier, but there are so many revivals.

The key to dating it seems to be the closure, which is not magnetic, it's an old press stud one!
It's also rather ineffective against the weight of the bag sides which keep forcing it open.
Therefore I'm going to add 2 large magnetic closures to it on either side of the existing one but spaced out on the contact points.

I'm thrilled to have my suspicions about the period of the 1980s pretty much confirmed. I might add the bag is in mint condition.

I feel that I underpaid for the bag but neither of us realised what we had. I guess that's what's best of all. And this makes me an emerging addict. to be clear I've become interested in vintage because of quality and because some items are overlooked and can be restored and recycled.
I am a member of a purse forum, but they aren't so interested in overlooked labels. It's all Chanel, and Louis Vuitton etc etc.
There is no listing for the overlooked ones, like Bally. Which I think has amazing quality for the price.

Sorry if I'm veering off topic, I'm just so thrilled.

I got pooped on by a bird just as I was taking it home and someone remarked it was actually a good luck omen. And it is... LOL!
 
That sounds like a great find, @azure5 ! I know the quality of vintage Bally shoes as I've handled a few since getting into vintage, and I should imagine their bags were just as good! There's definitely a lot more beyond the "usual" brands that everyone seems to be going for if you go into vintage - and isn't that just the beauty of it? And who wants to have another Chanel or Vuitton that everyone has (or it's fake...) :hysterical:.
 
Midge said:
That sounds like a great find, @azure5 ! I know the quality of vintage Bally shoes as I've handled a few since getting into vintage, and I should imagine their bags were just as good! There's definitely a lot more beyond the "usual" brands that everyone seems to be going for if you go into vintage - and isn't that just the beauty of it? And who wants to have another Chanel or Vuitton that everyone has (or it's fake...) :hysterical:.
Click to expand...

Thanks Midge and yes, very true! It seems ridiculous that people won't necessarily value an item for its intrinsic worth re the skills and quality of materials to make it, and design elements. Instead it's about identification with a brand. This is mass marketing writ large.

The conformity is a reminder of having once found myself dancing to some music in a Sydney (Australia) venue, and I noticed nobody else was dancing. And I said why aren't they dancing? And somebody said: Oh they just don't recognise the music. (!)

This was in the too cool for school 90s. Where I live, Melbourne, people are more likely to take risks with what they wear and in general, it's more arty, by and large.

People anywhere can be so afraid to step out of the norm and to value their own judgement. Brand names can have a tribal quality to them. The ironic thing is that inside the structure some of them aren't so well made. I bought a Chanel tote, it's nothing fancy, a Travel Line one to fix and flip. And the base was collapsed but the rest was almost perfect just grubby.

I unstitched the lining, and the base was simply a type of cardboard some of which had turned to a rust coloured powder and the rest was just disintegrating. This is a bag that when new would have been around AUS$1,650. not top of the range for sure, but that's still a hefty price. For cardboard. Also the feet might say Chanel, very nice but the wings that open up inside to install it are cheap and rough. Astonishing really, but I recall my cobbler mentioning something like this in total amazement at the chutzpah. I'm often problem-solving salvaging things with him but haven't been able to see him due to lockdowns...anyway I've inserted a recycled piece of my local politicians decal, he's equivalent to a Democrat. It's not as subversive as then apprentice tailor Alexander McQueen's comments to Prince Charles in his jackets, but it will do.

By contrast, I bought this Bally bag because something about it spoke to me, couldn't even see it properly on eBay but the design intrigued me. It's a big bag but I'm a tall slim woman and find I can carry it off. Sometimes people buy a bag without a thought as to how it suits their body shape or type. The quality is stunning it's in top nick. So happy to have saved it, and to have it in my life. I also salvaged some old suitcases, one of which has leather handles and looks like something that would have gone on the Orient Express in the 1930s.

I will take some photos tomorrow and post them if I can work out how...

Another lesser known item I recently bought is a Mila Schon bucket bag. Impossible to find anything comparable on the internet. I bought it at auction and it was part of a collector's estate. Someone put a low ball offer on and seemed riled up that I pushed the price up. But I had to have it...it's just so well made, and glowing. The quality is just there. Waiting for that to arrive, should be this week...the mail is haywire here due to Covid disruption. We just got out of 18 months of the hardest lockdown in the world. But we've saved countless lives in the process.

One thing I can't totally agree on is the idea that you should do no harm with a preloved item. If an item doesn't have much appeal, in my opinion it's OK to jazz it up a bit, especially if it's not rare. I'm thinking of a very ordinary canvas brown Bally bag I bought on eBay and still awaiting delivery of. Cheap and nobody wanted it, was on the market for literally years on eBay. I am probably going to put an embroidered blue dragon on it. This may have everyone here reaching for the smelling salts in shock, and maybe having me excommunicated in record time...but really it's a dirt common-looking bag. And it needs something. I will also work on the structure, it's collapsed. Then consider the options. That one I want to flip like the Chanel.

I wouldn't change a thing about the purple snakeskin. It's extraordinary. It's a keeper.

Sorry about the rave. Blame it on the lockdown. We're being fully let out of the pen on this Friday to actually shop.
 
I unstitched the lining, and the base was simply a type of cardboard some of which had turned to a rust coloured powder and the rest was just disintegrating.
Click to expand...
I bet the powder is the dreaded "devil dust" that we've talked about before here - basically some kind of foam-type material that desintegrates completely with age. Often also found in shoes or in bra padding or the like.

You are so right... I remember sitting in a café outside on Helsinki's Esplanadi in summer a few years ago with my mother and we were just laughing about how many Vuitton or wannabe Vuitton bags passed us by. And you could bet a large portion of them would have been wannabes. Mom had been on a trip with her best friend recently before that, also doing people-watching in an outdoor café, and she told me how many of those Vuittons they spotted her friend identified as fake (she's someone who can tell because she's the type who could afford the real thing for a while, but then she's the type with an eye for classic style, she buys things and wears them for decades - and she's the most un-snobbish person you'd ever meet).

I can feel - you - I have many friends and business partners in Melbourne and around, and your lockdown has been really harsh - I'm keeping my fingers crossed for all of you!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top