Balance, a desirable point between two or more opposite forces.

Isn’t that a lovely image? When I imagine it, I feel calm and indeed I feel happy. And that’s why we, as mothers, work so hard to attain it.

We spend our days thinking - have I prepared a balanced meal? Have I balanced my check book? Is my work and personal life in balance? Heck…can I balance myself on roller blades?

When I have it, I know it and when I don’t I feel it.

Yes indeed balance is a useful concept.

But why would I go on about that word here…on a handbag website? Isn’t this just about luxury, beautiful craftsmanship and indulgences? Isn’t it about spoiling oneself. There is no balance here and there needn’t be. Handbags are simply a one-sided, out of balance treat. And we deserve it….

And yet, I don’t feel that way about the true BE woman. When I think of her I think of all her various dimensions. She is confident, and well rounded. She has many interests and many priorities and she is able to juggle them all. And as part of that, she finds her balance. A balance that is unique to her.

A few weeks ago a friend invited me and my family to be part of an important day - a day dedicated to ending breast cancer. We, and several others gathered at her house to simply wear pink, make and hand out pink lemonade and say thank you to the walkers who were raising money to end this terrible disease. I didn’t carry a handbag. My hair wasn’t done, and I didn’t worry about balance. I just did what I could for a cause that was greater than all of us.

My experience touched me deeply. So many people pulled together to attack this disease. Everyone was smiling and everyone was giving. It was a moving day. And then…we all left and went on with our lives.

The next day, as I picked up my beautiful BE bag, I reflected on why I was in a position to enjoy this luxury. It didn’t feel indulgent to wear my bag and it didn’t feel one-sided; because what I wear is a refection of how I see myself and more importantly, how I feel about myself, not a statement to show my worth. Yes I deserved to carry my bag that day. My life was in balance.

The author is an independent, stylish woman from Canada who manages to juggle a high-powered job with a global company with raising two gorgeous children and a very busy family life. We have always felt that she deserves a medal for the way she balances everything with apparent ease.

Jackie

Hong Kong shoppers do not seem to buy out of necessity — as long as it’s something that is up-to-date and stylish, they will it. I recently found out that Asia accounts for 40% of world luxury brand sales and outside of Japan, Hong Kong buys more luxury items than any other Asians. A sales woman in Harvey Nichols advised me that some consumers may not use their expensive handbags more than a few times. Some women buy new handbags all the time — some use them for a few days and some don’t even use them at all. I can’t imagine not using my gorgeous BE handbags only a few times, let alone never! Can you?

Ashley

If you have been following this story you will know by now that making a BE handbag is a time-consuming and hand-crafted process.

And here they are all lined up in a row and almost ready to go…

BREAKING NEWS…. BREAKING NEWS….I have had so many requests this week for different things that I have decided that there will be a moratorium on the extra charge for a bespoke order until 20 October 2008 to help people to get what they want.

In other words, until 20 October 2008, you can order any bag in any colour and not pay any extra for the service for bags to be delivered any time up until Christmas. It will cost the usual price of the bag, plus the shipping. I just felt that unless we did this there would be a lot of people waiting for others to make up their minds to see whether their order would go ahead.

All you need to do is place your deposit on the website stating what it is for. At present we do not have a proper way of ordering the bespokes on the internet, so for now just do the following:

1. Choose your style
2. Choose your leather from:

• Pony Skin
• Matte Tan
• Glossy red
• Matte Black
• Mottled Silver
• Matte Chocolate
• Mottled Gold
• Matte Tan
• Apple matte
• Purple Matte
• Matte dark grey
• Glossy purple
• Glossy petrol
• Glossy wine
• Apple glossy
• Glossy red
• Glossy light grey
• Glossy fuchsia
• Choc pebble glossy
• Black pebble glossy
• Plum crash
• Chocolate crash
• Pewter crash
• Black crash
• Mustard w sheen
• Cream Stamped Croc
• Tan Stamped Croc
• White and gold Stamped Croc
• Pink Stamped Croc
• Aquamarine Stamped Croc
• Python – price on request – MULBERRY, SAND, PURPLE, BLACK, wine, PEWTER

3. Choose your hardware
4. Place a deposit online stating all the details including when you want the bag to be delivered
5. State your delivery date - only at this point will you pay the oustanding amount.

We will get back to you and confirm.

The stamped pony skin is a very unique material which is perfect for a small clutch. As a fun bag, the Hold Me looks great in the stamped croc leather and the stamped pony skin and the real python. For help deciding please email rose(@)belenechandia.com - but remove the brackets first.

Jackie

As promised, here are the first pictures of the Make Me Smile Midi in petrol being cut…

I flew out to Italy on Monday morning. Unfortunately in the last few months I have developed a fear of flying, which wasn’t helped by the recent Madrid crash and the media coverage of every small incident which followed, so I wasn’t much looking forward to it. But the flight was wonderfully smooth and I sat next to a lovely lady called Jean from Manchester who chatted away to me about her grandchildren to take my mind off things. If you are reading this Jean, thank you very much! Jean loved the window seat and got a bit upset when I asked her to shut the blind so that I wouldn’t see the mountains below (I was thinking “how cold would it be if we ended up there”, she was thinking “how pretty”) so I appeased her by asking her to take these pictures for the blog.

“Ooh and why did I wear jeans…it would be impossible to use them as a float”. Jean is smiling at me. “Shall I take another picture, dear” The sea looks lovely from this height. “Brrr to me it just looks cold”. Here we are just about to hit the sea…er.. land.

Relieved to have my feet on solid ground again I took the train along the pretty Ligurian Coast and headed straight for the leather workshop. I usually have to wait until the end of October to hear anything about new leathers but there is already a buzz about some new things - will have to wait until later to see the new colour chart though. Already excited!

Thought you might like to see the Italian countryside we are driving through so I asked M to stop the car and let me take a picture. Italians always want to do the very best though, so instead he drove me to the top of the valley so I could take a picture from there. Look at the ocean.. just a shame we cannot swim at this time of year.

Our next mission was to collect the petrol leather for the bespoke order of Make Me Smile midi bags we are producing. As I reported last week we are using the same leather as Prada and Miu Miu this season and we managed to get the last box of petrol which was headed for their workshop. So ladies… here it is. Step one of your Make Me Smile midi bags! The leather itself. Sometimes we have to check the leather carefully but given that it had been selected for Prada it was obviously the best quality.

And off it goes to the workshop. Aw… my workshop owner is shy. He didn’t want to be photographed so he hid behind it… Stay tuned for more updates.