Hermes Kelly Classique To Go Wallet Handmade In Epsom Calfskin Leather and America Crocodile Silver Hardware M4 Girs Pale 0V Girs Ciment

Two greys, one shade apart: this is the quietest way to wear contrast that I have found. Gris Pale on one part and Gris Ciment on the other, with the listing pairing Epsom calfskin and a touch of America crocodile, so the surface carries both a pressed grain and, somewhere on it, a scale pattern that changes the way light sits.

Nineteen centimetres long, eleven and a half wide, and only one and a half deep – the shape is a long wallet, flat enough to disappear into a jacket’s inside pocket and formal enough to carry as a clutch to a restaurant. Silver hardware suits the cool greys; a warmer metal would have muddied them.

Inside it takes the usual load: cards, notes that lie flat without folding, a key, perhaps a receipt or two. The two tones also make it easy to remember which side is which when I am reaching into a bag without looking, a small thing I have come to rely on. It is also the least seasonal thing in the house – grey on grey works as easily in July as in January.

What to know about crocodile in a piece like this: the scale sections are stiffer than the calf around them, so the wallet feels firm across one panel and folds more freely across the other. I find that pleasant; someone expecting absolute uniformity might not.

Worn with grey, black, white or denim it looks like something that has always been in the wardrobe rather than something new.