Best of the bag bunch

MAARTEN HOLL/The Dominion Post

IN PROPORTION: Samantha Hannah and Susan de Vere designed their bags to look good on the body.

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Pear-shaped, petite, tall or lean – a new range of bags are designed to be your faithful friend. They'll make you look good and your life easier as well, according to their designer, style consultant Samantha Hannah, who has put a lot of considered thought and research into the designs.

A busy mother of two as well as a working woman with an environmental conscience and passion for fashion, Hannah had a lot of boxes to tick in her pursuit of creating the perfect handbag. Colour and body shape were also important considerations.

The result is a well thought-out range featuring a satchel, handbag and matching wallets made of colourful cowhide and fish skin by Konev Leather in Wellington.

Entitled "In the Pond", the limited edition winter collection is inspired by the beauty of the gardens of Versailles and French garden planning.

The satchels are big enough to fit a small laptop. Features include a cellphone pocket on the outside.

"Because I'm a mum on the go I can't stand fishing for anything. With the pocket on the back you can feel it [your phone] all the time and you don't have to dig – just pick it up and talk," Hannah says.

The linings of each bag are vibrant red, providing a deliberate burst of colour each time you open the flap.

"Red provides a pop of energy. It's energy and passion. If you're having a gray day all you need to do is look inside and the red will make you smile."

The bags have also been designed to suit most body shapes and to sit comfortably in the most flattering part of a woman's waistline.

"With handbags this is really important. What a lot of people do is choose an oversized handbag, which makes you as wide as the handbag. Or an undersized handbag, which just looks wanting on the body. It looks proportionately wrong," she says. "I researched the general shape that New Zealanders are, which is either round or big on the bottom and smaller on the top. The shape suits those body shapes and as the leather ages and softens it becomes slouchier, which suits curves, yet its rectangle design also suits a tall slim person. It's still got structure."

The bags also have "feet" – the sign of a good handbag, and a must for Suzanne de Vere of Konev, who commissioned Hannah to design this range. De Vere once ruined a favourite handbag when she placed it on the changing room floor of a high brow boutique after its floors had just been cleaned, and the residue of the astringent chemicals ate into the leather.

Each bag of the limited edition range – made in Wellington from 95 per cent New Zealand cowhide and fish skin leather – has the letter "S" cut into the leather, referencing, among other things, smart, stylish, sustainable, and Samantha and Suzanne.

- © Fairfax NZ News