Hermes Kelly 25 Bag Handmade In Porosus Crocodile Leather From France Silver Hardware 89 Noir

Black crocodile at a premiere is close to a uniform, and this Kelly 25 with silver hardware is my favourite version of it. Porosus scales are the largest and most orderly of the crocodile family, wide belly tiles and symmetrical rows, and dyed black the skin becomes almost obsidian, with the ridges catching light like armour plating.

The bag is firm and architectural: when you set it down, it sits. The silver hardware keeps the whole thing cool and modern; gold would have made it warmer, more traditional, and slightly older than I feel. On a 25 by 17 by 7 cm body the capacity is strictly evening: phone, card holder, keys, a lipstick, a compact, which is exactly what stops it being anything but right on a formal night out.

I like the weight of it more than I expected. Porosus is a dense skin, and the bag rests on the arm with a certain intention, nothing like the airiness of a small calf bag.

Honest notes: crocodile and rain do not mix, and black crocodile with silver is unforgiving of dust, because the plates show fingerprints immediately. Thirty seconds with a cloth and a dry forecast, and this bag will outlive every trend it walks past. It is the most formal piece I own, and the only one that has never once felt out of place at black tie.