Chanel Announces E-Commerce Launch, Could Be as Early as Fall 2016

If you’ve been waiting for the day you can buy a brand new Chanel bag online, your wait is almost up–sort of. Late last week, Women’s Wear Daily spoke to Bruno Pavlovsky, Chanel’s president of fashion, during the brand’s re-showing of the Metiers d’Art 2015 collection in New York City. During the conversation, he confirmed some of what has been long rumored about the brand’s planned expansion into online sales.

Pavlovsky was cagey about the details, many of which have likely not been finalized at this early date, but he did tell WWD that the brand is testing approaches to the launch. He did specify, though, that “everything that we are doing has to be linked with some brick-and-mortar boutiques.” That’s in line with Chanel’s previous statements about the company’s views on e-commerce, particularly around the recent “harmonization” of the brand’s worldwide prices.
We don’t know exactly what that will mean yet or how it will affect the availability of products to individual customers. In addition, the Fall 2016 launch is not set in stone, and brands as big as Chanel tend to be careful and deliberate with changes like these. Chanel already sells its full lines of cosmetics, skincare and fragrance on its website, though, so the wheels have already slowly started to creak into motion.
Are you looking forward to one day being able to shop Chanel online?

Thieves Make Off With Over $1 Million in Hermès Bags

If the Hermès resale market seems suddenly more flush in the near future, there might be a very good reason why: At the end of last week, a band of thieves filched 500 Hermès bags from a packaging and logistics facility outside Paris, according to Women’s Wear Daily.
The six thieves targeted the facility, CAMS in Le Plessis-Bouchard, because it had been contracted to package and transport the bags, and they chose a time to strike when the only person on the premises was the manager, whom they forced to load the bags onto their truck. Curiously, WWD also notes that the thieves were not visibly armed on surveillance footage. They are still at large.Cheap Bag From Louis Vuitton Outlet Online
The bags in question had individual values of up to 5,000 euros, or $5,354 at current exchange rate. That would seem to indicate that the stolen bags weren’t the brand’s most famous models–Birkins, for example, start at prices nearly twice that of the most expensive bag in the missing group.
This incident is the latest in a series of luxury goods robberies across the world, usually involving accessories, jewelry and timepieces that have rabid resale markets.

Louis Vuitton’s Fall 2015 Bags are the Brand’s Best in Years

At Louis Vuitton, handbags are king. The brand might now make full lines of ready-to-wear, outerwear, shoes, accessories and jewelry, but if the bags are selling, none of that other stuff really matters. With the new bags that debuted as part of the brand's Fall 2015 collection this morning, that shouldn't be a problem.Shop For 100% Authentic Luxury Handbags

Many of the new shapes in this collection were petite trunks, some of which were customizable; they looked like they'd be perfect home decor objects instead of something that someone might actually carry. Vuitton's ardent fans have long collected the brand's trunks to display in their homes, and these smaller, non-monogram versions would be perfect for that. I can see the Instagrams now.
The functional bags were also a treat. Most of them felt fresh and young without sacrificing the sophistication for which Nicolas Ghesquiere is known, and although the stone-studded ones were a little challenging for my taste, the rest of the group more than made up for it. A particular favorite was the white Alma, stamped with a big version of the brand's logo--somehow, it felt worlds away from the logo bags for which the brand is known.
Check out the full runway collection below.