Heritage of a reinvented icon
The story of the Saddle bag Dior, from Galliano's boldness to contemporary men's wardrobe
When John Galliano, then artistic director of the house Christian Dior since 1996, presented the Spring-Summer 2000 collection during a legendary show in October 1999, he introduced on his arm an accessory that was still unprecedented: a small bag with an asymmetrical, curved silhouette, almost bent like a jockey's seat. The Saddle bag was born. Directly inspired by the equestrian world, a discreet homage to English saddles and a whole iconography of cavalry, this bag breaks with the leather goods codes of the time: neither rectangular, nor structured, nor discreet, it instead claims an unexpected geometry, a form of offbeat chic that the Anglo-Saxon press would call ugly chic.
The reception exceeded all expectations. Adopted within a few months by Carrie Bradshaw in Sex and the City, by Beyoncé, Paris Hilton, and Foxy Brown, the Saddle became in less than a season the first It-bag of the 21st century, boosting the accessory sales of the house by more than 60% that same year. Reinterpreted endlessly by Galliano throughout the collections in denim, in Dior Oblique canvas, in precious leathers, in jewelry versions, it marks an aesthetic break that will profoundly redefine how a fashion house envisions its accessory wardrobe.
After a period of eclipse at the end of the 2000s, the Saddle made a notable comeback in 2018 under the dual impetus of Maria Grazia Chiuri, artistic director of women's ready-to-wear Dior, and Kim Jones, who had just been appointed head of Dior Men. It is precisely in this renaissance that the Sac Messenger Saddle Small fits: designed for the contemporary man, it transposes the original equestrian silhouette into a resolutely urban messenger format, where the Dior Oblique jacquard canvas created in 1967 by Marc Bohan, which has since become one of the most coveted signatures in global luxury, meets the nobility of grained calf leather. The flap retains the Saddle curve; the aluminum buckle now replaces the original bit and stirrup; the spirit remains intact. More than twenty-five years after its creation, the Saddle continues to write its story within the house at 30 avenue Montaigne, proving that true fashion icons never really leave the stage.
Creative vision and exceptional know-how