As the wintry holiday season comes to a close, some of the most wholesome moments on social media came from users sharing their favorite holiday highlights. Seems innocent enough, right? But if you’re wondering why Black women were sharing images of their prized Coach purses, here’s the backstory.

Threads user @thehoodhousewife posted that she was overwhelmed with joy after receiving a Coach purse from her family for Christmas. When it first appeared on my timeline, my heart recognized that love— that familiar sensation of having received your first Coach bag as a Black woman. 

This joyful experience is something quite a few Black women can relate to. While many users celebrated with her, the faux luxury goods experts seized that wholesome moment to call into question Black women’s style and fashion choices. This resulted in the brand trending on Threads as users posted images of their favorite leather accessories. All the beautiful images made one thing clear: Black women love Coach bags real bad.  

Black women’s joy for the leather brand brings out the trolls

First, let’s dispel some common misconceptions about luxury fashion brands. Despite experts declaring Coach a quality leather brand, people still get on the internet and call it “cheap” or “ghetto”. So what’s the issue? Do these people believe that Black women are incapable of understanding high-quality goods? Or, is it that people don’t believe that Black women deserve nice things, too? 

The social media conversations around accessible luxury brands such as Coach, encourage thinly veiled anti-Black sentiments and dog whistles when it comes to Black consumers. And that can’t be overlooked, besides, it’s a frivolous argument because the concept of luxury has always been based on the perceptions of the consumers.

And while it’s true, Black people are not a monolith—we can all acknowledge that we collectively share similar experiences throughout the Black diaspora. I can relate to other Black women who also have generational bonds between their purses. Buying a new Coach bag is pure joy. Being given a Coach bag as a gift is a sign of love and appreciation. But receiving a used Coach bag from a Black woman is akin to an unofficial ritual of welcoming Black girls into Black womanhood. 

The unspoken traditions of Black women

I’ll admit, there’s a certain ghetto fabulosity about inheriting a Coach bag which felt like an unspoken rites of passage. It’s more than just a pocketbook. Coach bags are one of the few things Black women have normalized as traditionalized heirlooms. The gesture of your sister-friends, aunties, and grandmothers gifting you a purse is a nod to your future self. It also feels like a treasure that is designed to protect you. 

For myself, my introduction to Coach bags started at the tender age of eight. My maternal grandmother was an employee at Marshall Field’s Watertower in Chicago and she started sending me her used bags on Christmas Day. The first Coach purse she sent me was the classic Compact Post Pouch; it was small, black and convenient. When I first received it, I was unimpressed. It wasn’t flashy, but it was versatile. So I did what any other kid would do when they received something special without having a clue of its value; I placed my toys and random notes in it and then it became a dress-up accessory for pretend play. 

The flyest bag lady

Even though I didn’t understand the magnitude of my grandmother’s gift, I knew it was a special bag, by the way my mother and grandmothers swooned over it. But to me, it was just another “purse to wear to church”. By the time I was in middle school, I had a drawer filled with Coach, Dooney & Bourke and Liz Claiborne bags that were ready to welcome me into my junior high school years. Now, the Coach pouch bag, which I only wore to church and maybe the doctor’s office, transformed into an everyday essential.

Gone were the random Barbie clothes, ripped coloring book pages and empty candy wrappers. Now my bag held my CTA tokens, school ID, money, address book, makeup and pager (yea, I’m that old). While the empty candy wrappers occasionally lingered, they made room for my toiletries and sanitary necessities that encouraged me to survive and thrive while hanging out in the streets. My first Coach bag felt like my superhero bag. I cherished those quiet recognitions from older women who paths I crossed as they eyed my purse and gave me a nod of approval.

Nothing like being blessed with a bag from your grandmother

And while my first coach bag was gently used, the faint smell of my grandmother’s parfum mixed with her bergamot hair grease and prayer oil always soothed me and gave me the confidence I needed to take on a world that was structured to hate me. My bag felt blessed and highly favored and in my time of need, it was. 

Yes, there’s a certain ghetto fabulosity about inheriting a generational Coach bag.

Since then, and throughout my childhood, my mother, grandmothers and sistren would give me several bags that I held close. By the time I was a young adult, I had a number of bags that held not just my personal items, but the lived experiences of the Black women who loved me and previously owned the bag, too. 

Lastly, my foremothers may not have had traditional family heirlooms like jewelry and such to pass down to my family and me. But they had bags; high-quality bags that they preserved through the years for the next generation. Those bags kept their secrets, dreams and weapons when necessary. And in turn, they gifted me a purse that had more life experiences than I ever could to guide me and nurture the adult within me.