Designer Handbags with a difference…

Featured this month are Louise Hempleman’s gorgeous designer handbags, designer handbags with a difference – you don’t need to break the bank to own one!

Wouldn’t we all just love to buy our very own genuine designer handbag, a nice Fendi, or Gucci, or maybe a Prada, something drop dead gorgeous that would make us feel fantastic every time that we walked out of the door with it swinging from our arm?

I know that I would but like most other people, try as I might, I just can’t justify lavishing £500+ on myself no matter how much I tell myself that I honestly really do need that incredible piece of arm candy & how much better my life would be if I had it!

Sad as this is I still would never succumb to buying one of those knock offs that the bloke sells down at the local market, to me they just scream “she’s all fur coat & no knickers,” and whilst some people might say that’s true, I certainly don’t intend to go around advertising it!

No, if I can’t have the real thing then I’ll do without thank you kindly.

That’s why I was delighted & excited to discover the Hempleman Collection by English designer Louise Hempleman, & why I just had to include them as this months featured handbags.

Louise Hempleman is a colourful enough character herself, she is the daughter of famous English explorer David Hempleman-Adams, & has a lot of experience in the fashion industry – she started out designing the handbags faithful & enduring companion, & other must have accessory, the shoe.

The Hempleman Collection handbags really are just something else.

Stunning eye catching designs are perfectly balanced with the highest quality materials & manufacturing, & the prices have to be seen to be believed – you can pay more for a run of the mill, mass produced bag that’s sold in every other high street shop than you’d part with for one of these beauties, incredible when you consider that these are leather handbags, not synthetics!

There is a great selection of styles, colours, & designs, like the green & white handbag above from the “St Tropez” range (£145), the amazing “Betty Barrel” below (£145), the stunningly beautiful “Victoria” range (an incredible £125), & the ultra elegant “Monaco” which comes in 3 sizes (£145, £175, & £225) shown at the end of this article, to name but 4 of my favourites!

For me one of the things that makes the Hempleman Collection stand out is the clever way that Louise Hempleman has managed to mix both contemporary styles & fashions, & yet at the same time to draw inspiration from the timeless simplicity, grace, & sophistication from the era associated with big screen stars such as Audrey Hepburn.

The Monaco range of handbags for example epitomises this perfectly, with simple lines, a wonderful kind of almost pleated leather, & fantastic contrasting trims creating a simple, yet beautiful overall look – think Breakfast at Tiffanys & you’ll see what I mean.

Personally one of the things that appeals to me the most about owning any designer handbag is not just the name, or the look, it’s that you should be getting something of a far superior quality to the mass produced high street handbags, but I’ve often thought that this isn’t necessarily the case, & that often 50% plus of the price is in the name of the maker.

That’s partly why I decided to start this online bags & handbags magazine – to find companies that make exceptional quality, highly desirable bags but that don’t have an expensive big brand name to inflate the price, meaning that you’re only paying for the bag – which can save you enormous amounts of money – so keep coming back because we’ve found quite a lot of them!

This, of course, is one of the things that I love about the Hempleman designer handbags – the look, the obvious quality, & the price reflecting just the handbag itself.

This still seems odd though because Louise’s handbags have appeared in Vogue magazine among many others, & are sold, as I understand, in Harvey Nichols & Harrods, so they are hardly “unknown.”

Perhaps it’s just that they are still an up & coming name (they haven’t been around for that long after all), perhaps they’ll be the next “name” in designer handbags, but for now I’m left with a troubling dilemma.

I said at the beginning of this article that I couldn’t justify spending £500 on one jaw dropping piece of arm candy, so now that I’ve found myself a range of designer handbags where I really, really do actually defintely need to buy myself one the question is, do I just buy one Hempleman designer handbag, put the change in my purse & pat myself on the back for saving myself £350, or do I buy 3 Hemplemans for under £500 & pat myself on the back for getting such an incredible deal….

Hempleman handbags are available at Behold the Bag and from their new handbags website.