Hermes New H Passant Compact Wallet Handmade In Epsom Calfskin Leather 63 Vert Amanda

Green is the colour I am asked about least and recommend most. Vert Amanda is a soft, slightly grey-leaning green that sits between sage and the inside of a lime, and against silver hardware it looks calm in daylight and almost black in low light, a trick very few colours can pull.

The measurements are the slim H Passant’s: 18.5 by 12 cm, 1.6 cm thick closed, a flap over a body with the small H detail and an interior that opens flat. Epsom’s heat-stamped grain keeps the green even across the surface, so there is no variation from panel to panel.

Mine holds six cards, notes and a spare key, with the shallow zip taking coins or a couple of painkillers for travel days. The slim body forces a decision every morning, which I have come to appreciate: fewer cards means I actually know what is in there.

A trade-off and a scene. The trade-off is that pale green marks more easily than graphite or navy, so I keep it away from loose keys. The scene: a wedding lunch in summer, cream linen, and this wallet passing between hands at the table rather more often than the wedding album did.

Where it goes: a market on a Saturday, a long lunch, the kind of day when a bag is a nuisance and everything lives in your pockets. Green this soft also has one unexpected virtue, which is that it makes silver hardware look like a deliberate choice rather than a default. I have yet to find an outfit it disagrees with.