What makes an icon? It’s a question often pondered in the arena of fashion, and a label often overused. Longevity? Timelessness? Mass appeal? A combination of all of the above? Perhaps it’s less prescriptive; a magical conjuncture of qualities we’ll never quite be able to put our collective finger on. Whatever it is, we can be fairly certain that Dior’s Saddle bag has it.
It made its debut in 1999, designed by then-Creative Director John Galliano as part of Dior’s spring/summer 2000 collection. Fashion lore suggests it was inspired by photographer Helmut Newton’s iconic, provocative 1976 composition ‘Saddle 1’, though this remains a mysterious, unconfirmed nugget of information.
