Romance permeated the atmosphere at London’s St. Pancras station on Tuesday, and not solely due to the burgeoning power duo of Dua Lipa and actor Callum Turner returning from a Parisian escapade.
Apart from their matching leather jackets, there was an air of nostalgia, even sentimentality, about their attire. Lipa, toting a black Hermés handbag adorned with a jumbled array of trinkets, a checkerboard claw hair clip, and a Hermès Twilly scarf, appeared to be drawing inspiration from another aficionado of eclectic clutter — the late Jane Birkin.
Turner rolled along a silver Rimowa carry-on adorned with a plethora of luggage stickers. From a distance, the couple could have been mistaken for travelers straight out of the 1960s (although Lipa’s cherry Coke-colored hair and Puma sneakers did slightly give away the ruse), nostalgically accumulating souvenirs and tokens from their journeys abroad.
Luggage emblems reminiscent of the stickers adorning Turner’s suitcase first emerged in the 1900s, often provided by luxurious, grand hotels like the Hotel Sole in Palermo, Italy, or the Hotel Europa in Costa Rica. Inspired by the travel posters of the era, a well-designed sticker served as free advertising for an establishment when affixed to a stylish guest’s luggage, signaling their affluent travel habits.
“In this era of nostalgia… I advocate for the revival of the travel sticker,” declared the New York Times in 1971, asserting that these colorful embellishments are crucial for conjuring fond memories and setting oneself apart. Birkin herself admitted that her eclectic mix of bag charms was a form of self-expression. “There's no joy in a bag that hasn't been through the wringer,” she divulged to Vogue in 2011, “I always adorn mine with stickers and beads and worry-beads. You can find them anywhere in the world, from Greece to Israel to Palestine. I always embellish my bags because I dislike them looking uniform.”
In an era increasingly dominated by digitality, tangible artifacts are experiencing a renaissance. Last December, vinyl record sales in the UK soared to their highest levels since 1990. Similarly, during Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour in 2023, fans exchanged handmade friendship bracelets instead of social media handles.
Perhaps Lipa — who has been steadily expanding her collection of quirky bag charms since November, starting with just a few woven keychains — is also gravitating towards physical keepsakes. Birkin would undoubtedly endorse such sentiment.
