Hermès Kelly Cut Bleu Encre Chèvre Mysore Gold Hardware 2021

This is goatskin, not calf. Chèvre Mysore has a fine ridged grain rather than a pebbled one, with a distinct sheen running along the ridges, and the hide is light, stiff, and hard-wearing. In a flat clutch that stiffness is the argument: the panel stays true instead of bowing, which a softer leather at this size eventually will.

Bleu Encre is an ink blue — dark enough to read as black at distance, unmistakably blue in daylight. Chèvre catches light along its ridges, so the colour moves across the panel as the bag turns. It is the one thing about this leather a photograph consistently fails to carry.

The Kelly Cut is an elongated clutch derived from the Kelly, made in a single size of roughly 31cm, with the sangles and touret of the full bag laid across its front. Gold hardware, warm against a cold blue.

Blind stamp Z (2021). In excellent condition, with its original dust bag. Authenticated in-house.