HERMES 140cm CASHMERE SHAWL - CLIC CLAC AU POIS
by JULIA ABADIE
Back in 2015, I took a bucket list rip to Paris with two friends. It was a chilly January, but that's when one of France's semi-annual national sales takes place. My friends were all about Paris; I was all about Hermes! A couple of days before the Hermes sale, I had the immense pleasure, thanks to a French friend's cousin who worked at Hermes, to get a private tour of the Emile Hermes collection above the mothership at 24 Faubourg. It was squeal-worthy to see so many artifacts that inspired some of most iconic scarf designs.
After the tour I met my friends downstairs in the boutique. It was crowded, and the SAs definitely didn't want to indulge a bunch of tourists in exploring every scarf on hand. But one friend and I both spotted this shawl on display at the same time. Alas it was the only one in stock and my friend graciously let me add it to my shopping bag (got a pair of orange Isthme earring to go with!).
The next day was Day One of the sale, back in the day when it was open to the public. We arrived to queue up at 5a and we were NOT in the first group of 50 to be let in! The whole process of the sale was an experience, from coat check (note: never go to coat check: you'll be overtaken by the experienced shoppers who arrived sans outerwear) to getting clear shopping bags and a numbered ID card, then lining up en masse for the rope drop.
Unlike the Toronto or New York sales, there were stations set up for each department - shoes, RTW, bangles, small leather goods, housewares, scarves and shawls. You stood in yet another line at each station where they let groups of 20 in to spend 20 minutes shopping. See something you want to buy? You give the SA your ID number and they set it aside for runners to gether and take into storage. When you're ready to exist the sale, you line up AGAIN for the cash registers, hand your ID card to the check-out team, they hand it to a runner who retrieves your stash from storage.
We hit scarves and shawls first, and as we were in line for bangles, we saw a runner taking items back to the stations that had been 'changed my mind' at the cash register, AND HE HAD THIS SHAWL HE WAS RETURNING TO THE SALE STATION!!! Lucky for us he was super nice (and likely inexperienced) and handed the scarf over. The friend who'd graciously relinquished claim to it in the boutique agreed we'd dollar-cost average the two shawls and be twinsies (and I got to bring it to the bangle station and pick out a couple of bracelets to complete the outfit). The cash register team was appalled that we had something that wasn't retrieved from storage but were kind enough to add it to the haul.
So, yeah, it's a great shawl and the memory is so delightful that it's pretty much a CDH scarf.
Sadly I don't have the Hermes Story Behind, but I seem to recall the original Clic Clac design from 1980 was inspired by canes in the Emile Hermes collection, and the clickety-clack sound they'd make on the cobblestone streets.
After the tour I met my friends downstairs in the boutique. It was crowded, and the SAs definitely didn't want to indulge a bunch of tourists in exploring every scarf on hand. But one friend and I both spotted this shawl on display at the same time. Alas it was the only one in stock and my friend graciously let me add it to my shopping bag (got a pair of orange Isthme earring to go with!).
The next day was Day One of the sale, back in the day when it was open to the public. We arrived to queue up at 5a and we were NOT in the first group of 50 to be let in! The whole process of the sale was an experience, from coat check (note: never go to coat check: you'll be overtaken by the experienced shoppers who arrived sans outerwear) to getting clear shopping bags and a numbered ID card, then lining up en masse for the rope drop.
Unlike the Toronto or New York sales, there were stations set up for each department - shoes, RTW, bangles, small leather goods, housewares, scarves and shawls. You stood in yet another line at each station where they let groups of 20 in to spend 20 minutes shopping. See something you want to buy? You give the SA your ID number and they set it aside for runners to gether and take into storage. When you're ready to exist the sale, you line up AGAIN for the cash registers, hand your ID card to the check-out team, they hand it to a runner who retrieves your stash from storage.
We hit scarves and shawls first, and as we were in line for bangles, we saw a runner taking items back to the stations that had been 'changed my mind' at the cash register, AND HE HAD THIS SHAWL HE WAS RETURNING TO THE SALE STATION!!! Lucky for us he was super nice (and likely inexperienced) and handed the scarf over. The friend who'd graciously relinquished claim to it in the boutique agreed we'd dollar-cost average the two shawls and be twinsies (and I got to bring it to the bangle station and pick out a couple of bracelets to complete the outfit). The cash register team was appalled that we had something that wasn't retrieved from storage but were kind enough to add it to the haul.
So, yeah, it's a great shawl and the memory is so delightful that it's pretty much a CDH scarf.
Sadly I don't have the Hermes Story Behind, but I seem to recall the original Clic Clac design from 1980 was inspired by canes in the Emile Hermes collection, and the clickety-clack sound they'd make on the cobblestone streets.
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