Hermès Birkin 25 Bag Handmade In Togo Calfskin Leather Gold Hardware 47 Chocolate

Chocolate brown was my mother’s handbag colour and it took me a while to come back to it. What brought me round is how well a deep brown leather ages: this one already looks warmer at the handle rolls than when I first carried it, and it is only getting better.

The bag is the standard twenty-five by twenty by thirteen, Togo from France, gold-tone hardware. Brown leather with gold metal is one of the oldest combinations in bagmaking and it still works, because the tones sit in the same family. The grain here is unusually consistent across the front panel, which you notice when the light is sideways.

What goes in: phone, card case, keys, a compact and a lipstick. It swallows all of that and still has usable space at the base. It is a bag for errands, school runs and dinners, and it does not look out of place at any of them.

The honest downside is variety. A chocolate bag solves a lot of outfits, which also means it can become the only bag you reach for, and it does not bring much contrast to dark clothing. If you want a palette lift, this is not the colour. One small preference of mine: brown leather looks better with a twilly than a charm, and this bag takes a scarf without fuss.

Marks show less on this leather than on almost any other, and Togo’s grain keeps the surface matte through daily handling.