Secrets of a handbag restorer Part 1.
After restoring handbags for 12 years, I have encountered a variety of weird and wonderful things. A handbag is a very personal item for a woman and can carry many secrets. Quite often, my service is sought after some sort of mishap or accident—some are run-of-the-mill, while others are extraordinary. I am going to share a few of those stories, keeping each of them anonymous, of course!
The Dog, A Fire, and A Chandelier?!
Many years ago, early in my career at The Handbag Spa, we had a client come to us with a rather unusual problem with her bag. It had several issues, including burn marks, smoke damage, and holes in the leather. The story goes, "One summer's day, I left my bag on a side table in the entrance hall of the house. Around noon, the sun came scorching through the window and shone directly through one of the prisms hanging from the chandelier, forming a direct line of light to the handbag on the top. After a while, the bag began to smoke and suddenly caught fire from the heat! The commotion frightened our pup, who was dozing sleepily in the hall. He jumped up and bit the bag! Luckily, we weren't too far away to see what had happened and put the fire out. The dog was absolutely fine, but sadly, my bag was worse off—it had been bitten right through the leather, leaving it burnt and holey!"
Naughty Mouse
This was quite a peculiar case and something I have only seen once in my career! A client came to us with a strange predicament: they had pulled their bag out of storage only to find that a tiny mouse had chewed a hole through the lining and crawled inside the bag to die. It then decomposed into the leather, leaving a dark stain—gross, right?! So, it was our job to clean it, remove the bacteria, and sew up the hole. Did I mention this job isn’t quite as glamorous as it might seem?
Check those inside pockets ladies!
I’ve pulled all sorts of things out of clients' bags, including hundreds of tampons, sanitary pads, fake eyelashes, hair, fingernails, jewelry, pills, loose change, makeup, keys, receipts—the list goes on. But this one definitely makes it into the hall of fame: a bullet dildo. Everything on that list just goes to show how important our bags are in our day-to-day lives. What would we do without them?! We have so much to carry.
Jealousy
In light of recent events in Australia, I think these stories are important to tell. Sadly, I have seen quite a few cases over time that demonstrate just the tip of what seems to be an increasing problem in our society: the jealous ex. It seems a handbag is a sure way to get to a woman, and I have seen many bags that have been destroyed through bad breakups. Here are just a few examples: a Louis Vuitton Speedy cut with scissors through the canvas and zipper, a Gucci with nail polish poured all over it on the outside and the interior lining, a Louis Vuitton Neverfull with its handles cut clean off, and another Neverfull with the word ‘SLAG’ drawn on the inside with a marker pen (ugh that one really makes my blood boil). For each of these women, I hope and pray you were able to get as far away from these people as possible. May the damage to your handbag be the worst thing that happened and a warning sign that they are not good people. Something is clearly broken in our society that needs fixing. May we all stand together as women and support one another through the good and the bad.
As you can imagine, this is just the tip of the iceberg of stories that I have, but they are certainly some of the ones that have stuck out to me and stayed with me. Keep an eye out for part 2!
If you would like a quote for your handbag, shoes or small leather goods then your’e in the right place, simply fill in my contact form and I will get back to you
Thank you for reading, Freya x