Bag Charms and the Commodification of Individuality

Is the latest Tiktok trend a genuine assertion of personal style or something far more complicated?

Screenshot from one of my fave OG fashion bloggers, White Lightning.

It has come to my attention that a new(-ish) TikTok trend is making the rounds. Bag charms, also known as “Jane Birkin-fying,” involves loading up a purse with a souvenir shops’ worth of keychains to create a visual effect not unlike the litany of prizes lurking at the bottom of the old-school arcade game “The Claw.” Bag charms are being touted as “the trend of the summer,” and though the trend technically started much earlier — Freak Friend Kristen Bateman wrote about the era of accessorized accessories for Vogue last year — it appears to have reached fever pitch. Everywhere I look, someone appears to be zhuzhing up a plain purse with some unholy combination of stuffed animals, beaded necklaces, coins, earrings and safety pins.

@themeganfordGwtting ready for summer with the easiest trend there ever was - bag charms! Are you into it? #summeraesthetic #summerlooks #bagcharm #miumiu #janebirkin @Megan Ford @Megan Ford

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The look is a direct take on the haute mess Miu Miu sent down the Spring 2024 runways; buttery leather purses laden down with heavy-looking chains, bungee cords and watch straps to disheveled, nonchalant effect. Last month, Hypebae published a story asking, “When did bag charms become cool again?” citing the spike in Google searches for bag charms as evidence of the trend.

As a certified tchotchke-lover, I love the idea of letting it all hang out with a little jingle jangle. But I can’t quite shake the irony that underpins the concept of personalization as a trend. It reminds me of the classic t-shirt quote, “You are unique, just like everybody else.” It should be easy to participate in the bag charm trend by cobbling together a rat king of accessories out of items already lying around your house. But if you’re going out of your way to buy a bunch of crappy new keychains to slap on a bag because you saw someone cooler than you do it on Tiktok first? Then it’s a hard no from me. You shouldn’t have to purchase your way in to a trend that is, ostensibly, about asserting one’s individuality.

@rachspeedi love it so much and I love that bag charms are back!! bag is from polene inspo from jane birkin #diy #styleinspo

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Several years ago, I wrote a feature story for FASHION about people who defile their designer bags by slapping on permanent patches or paint. (It was an incredibly fun story to write, not least because my main source eventually ran away from Toronto to become a stripper in Atlanta.) This was during the heavily quirked-up Alessandro Michele era at Gucci, when everyone wanted to dress like an eccentric grandma, and I loved that these women were using DIY to do their own thing. “Each patched-up look has an inimitable quality; no matter how wide the trend spreads, everyone still ends up with a unique bag,” I wrote. For people who interact with designer bags based on resale value, adding permanent patches was akin to mutilation. But I loved the refusal of these women to be precious about their expensive objects, rejecting snobbery and subverting our expectations of what a designer bag should be.

Bag charms don’t subvert anything. They’re easy to take on and off, making them an incredibly low stakes form of personalization. Not that there’s anything thing wrong with that, but I much prefer the Cat Marnell approach of really committing to the bit and letting your junkie graffiti artist friends spray paint all over a pristine white Chloé. (I’m pretty sure this is something that happens in How to Murder Your Life but I could be wrong.)

Like most trends, bag charms inhabit a wide gulf between charming and cringe. Where you land on the spectrum depends on how you choose to approach it. If you want to go forth and enjoy a little harmless flash in the pan microtrend, don’t let me stop you! I’m literally just a grumpy critic glowering from a small crevice of the internet I’ve carved out for myself. But if you find yourself layering a bunch of crap onto a bag just so you can look like your friends, you should probably ask yourself why. Set down the keychains and slowly back away.