In collaboration with Comme des Garcons’ Rei Kawakubo, Paco Rabanne has reissued his iconic 1969 chain-metal handbag, le69. The original bag was one of many pieces incorporating metal in Rabanne's rebellious couture line, sported by fashionable women such as Audrey Hepburn, Jane Birkin and Donyale Luna. 
 
The handbag comes in nine iterations, including steel, natural horn, stingray leather, warm brown vegetable-dyed leather, matte wine-colored suede, metallic powder pink suede, black rubber, perspex and aluminum.  It signifies the first stage in the relaunch of Paco Rabanne’s fashion house, further details for which are expected to be announced at Paris Fashion Week in February.
 
Currently, le69 is available for purchase in the United States only at Comme des Garcon in New York.  Phone orders from other states are welcome, and it is rumored that select stores in Los Angeles will be carrying the line later this year –- this might be worth holding your breath for.
 
Prices range from $965 to $2,200.

-- Raha Lewis

Photo: The newly reissued le69 bag, in several iterations. Credit: Paco Rabanne

I have fallen head over heels for these woven Wayuu Taya bags. Not only are they stylish in the summer-music-festival chic way, they are also supporting a good cause.

Each bag is handmade by Wayuu indigenous women in Venezuala. Proceeds from sales go to support the center at Shukumajaya, where women are educated about parenting and nutrition, family planning and hygiene.
 
Each one-of-a-kind bag is made with materials that have been used for hundreds of years.  It takes a Wayuu woman eight hours a week for 20 days to make each bag.

Katy Perry wore this fabulous pink version at Coachella. J. Crew has picked up on the stylish bags too, placing them in the June catalog and online.

Patricia Velásquez, a former model, founded the Wayuu Taya Foundation eight years ago to help indigenous people in her native country.

"We have built school rooms for the kids and helped the women become self-sufficient by producing and selling their unique bags," she wrote in an e-mail. "I am so happy that these bags have become a fashion item."

This year she will be expanding her efforts into Haiti by raising funds to build a school in a village devastated by the earthquake.

Wayuu Taya bags are $120 at www.wayuutaya.net.

--Booth Moore

RELATED:

Summer accessories that give back

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Photo: Katy Perry at the Coachella music festival. Credit: Photo Agency.

Back when Apple's iPad was first announced, I told you about Scottevest and how its travel vests were roomy enough to accommodate the new tablet. Today comes word of a suit that can stow it in style -- although in a slightly different way.

My sister-in-law forwarded me an Unplggd post about the one-of-a-kind $250 "upcycled" suit totes sold through a designer, curator and purveyor of limited-edition art products called Poketo, and made from 100% re-purposed men's suits and dress shirts, with handles cut from old leather couches.

"We started carrying the totes for Earth Day -- it didn't actually have anything to do with the iPad," said Angie Myung, co-owner and co-founder of Los Angeles-based Poketo. "But after Apartment Therapy's Unplggd wrote about it and said it would make a perfect carrying case for the iPad, we realized it was, so we took some new photos that kind of show it being used that way." Myung estimates they've sold close to 100 of the bags -- some to other stores, some directly through their website -- since they started carrying them in April.

Oh brother. We just got word that Rodarte designers Kate and Laura Mulleavy -- and a selection of their garments -- are scheduled to appear on "The Martha Stewart Show," locally on KNBC-TV Channel 4 on Thursday at 2 p.m. (sorry for the late notice).

The appearance of the two sisters from Pasadena is part of a siblings-themed episode that's described as follows: "An audience full of siblings; restaurateurs Bruce and Eric Bromberg prepare barbecued pork sandwiches and fried chicken; designers Kate and Laura Mulleavy; salted toffee-chocolate squares."

We're guessing that Martha's saving the Canadian design duo/twin set of Dan and Dean Caten of Dsquared2 for a potential twins-themed episode. (Which we'd like to see include workout tips from Major League Baseball's Minnesota Twins, and a cooking demonstration by Miami Beach's identical twin chefs Nicola and Fabrizio Carro of Quattro Gastronomia Italiana).

-- Adam Tschorn

More All The Rage coverage of Rodarte

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Photo: Designers Kate, left, and Laura Mulleavy, shown in 2009, will be one of several sets of brothers and sisters appearing on a siblings-themed episode of "The Martha Stewart Show." Credit:  Evan Agostini / Associated Press

Resident Image stylist and market editor Melissa Magsaysay soothes your sartorial woes in the weekly Your Stylist blog column.

Hi Your Stylist-

I recently turned 30 and realized it’s probably time I ditched the worn out H&M or Aldo bags and got myself   a grown-up bag with a real designer. My friend at work recently bought a used Louis Vuitton Speedy off EBay. While I like the size of her purse and that there’s a “green” factor that helps both the environment and my pocketbook, I don’t want the same thing. I also know this is weird, but I have a strong phobia of snakes, and even snake-skin bags and shoes kind of weird me out. I’m somewhat flexible on price if it means I’ll have the purse for years. Keeping these stipulations in mind, do you have any suggestions? KW, Los Angeles

There’s nothing quite like the first grown-up bag that will hang from your arm making you feel polished, put-together and confident: Your new best friend that comes with the price tag of about $1,000.

But because you’re ready to take the plunge and replace all of those disposable bags with something that you will keep and use for years to come, there are several designer styles to consider.

Your friend’s Speedy bag is a classic shape, and of course, you can’t really go wrong with the brown-and-beige LV logo leather. If you like that shape, take a look at the Bayswater bag from Mulberry. It’s a solid rectangle with a top flap and turn closure. It’s a classic and truly grown-up bag, but not something all your friends already have.

The Downtown bag from YSL is another iconic style that will serve you well for years to come. I love the angular shape of this one and the zippers and hardware add some edge. For something that looks more vintage and down to earth, the Paraty bag from Chloe is another style that will transcend several seasons. The cognac-colored leather will work in both the summer and a California fall, and the long and short straps give you options to hand-carry or throw it on your shoulder.

One of my favorite new bag lines is Jerome Dreyfuss -- especially if you want a bag that not everyone is going to be toting around.  The Parisian designer makes buttery leather bags in interesting and vivid colors as well as several   neutral shades such as this luggage leather hobo.

If the eco-friendly aspect still intrigues you, a Southern California-based label called Novella Royale makes high-end bags from recycled leather jackets. The styles here are trendier, with studs, fringe and smaller sizes, but the Clover and Van bags are on the more classic side. Plus you have the peace of mind about carrying re-purposed leather.

Whichever bag you choose, congratulations on making this important step in stocking your closet with big-girl bags. Each one is an investment, but remember that a beautiful bag can transform the simplest outfit into something really special.

Send your style queries to melissa.magsaysay@latimes.com

-- Melissa Magsaysay

MORE YOUR STYLIST COLUMNS:

The truth about this season's tie-dye trend

Eco-friendly jewelry

How to wear overalls without looking like a Marky Mark back-up dancer

Finding the right prom dress

Photos: Top left: Yves Saint Laurent Downtown bag, $1395/www.ysl.com. Top right: Chloe Paraty bag, $1895/www.netaporter.com. Middle left: Mulberry Bayswater, $950/Mulberry. Bottom left: Novella Royale Clover bag, $644/Novella Royale. Bottom right: Jerome Dreyfuss Bob bag, $995/Jerome Dreyfuss.

Stop the presses! Heidi Montag -- pictured above in a "before" photo, if you will -- showed off her swimsuit line, and her newly-designed body, over the weekend. [People]

Talbots horror: Survey showed consumers' identify the women's retailer with, ahem, much older ladies. Now with new styles and a boost from First Lady Michelle Obama, the stores are trying to skew younger. [Wall Street Journal] 

Here at All the Rage, we're all about fashion. And sometimes that means you just really want to wrap yourself in something that really makes a statement...like maybe Rolls-Royce's new Ghost. Oh, what six figures can buy. [Wall Street Journal]  

Men's staple Jos. A. Banks will test the factory-store concept later this year. [wwd] (Subscription required)

Rebecca Minkoff holds nothing back in bright bag collection for summer. [FabSugar]

Engagement pending? See an assortment of celebrity's engagement rings for inspiration. [FabSugar]

Tips to get a glowing complexion, now that winter's done. [StyleList]

Is this the season when stars disappear for a little nipping and tucking? Well, we certainly can't stand in the way of speculation! [StyleList]

Feeling home-bound? See looks from fashion shows around the world. [Guardian]

Coral lips look great at night, but you can pull off the look in the daytime, too. [BellaSugar]

The Sartorialist, Scott Schuman, talks about his vintage photo contest. [Huffington Post]

-- Susan Denley

Photo: Heidi Montag with husband Spencer Pratt Credit: Matt Sayles / Associated Press

We've mentioned Ecoist before -- it's a Miami-based company that turns old magazines, candy wrappers and soda-can pull tabs into handmade totes, handbags, and coin purses -- but there's something about its recently announced partnership with Frito-Lay North America that makes us chuckle.

The licensing deal with the snack-food subsidiary of PepsiCo means Ecoist will be turning unusable or obsolete packaging from Lays, Cheetos, Fritos, Tostitos and Sunchips into an assorted variety of items including purses, clutches and place mats.

But the best of the munch bunch has got to be the potato chip bowl -- which, according to the description,  is hand-woven from 260 "upcycled" Lays potato chip bags that would otherwise be destined for the dump.

Now if only Ecoist could help us do something about upcycling the extra material we find forming about our middle after snarfing down 260 bags of Lays potato chips, we'd really have the loop closed.

-- Adam Tschorn

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Photos: At top left, a sunflower baguette handmade from unchip snack-food packaging, $49. At top right, a clutch made from Tostito bags, $28. Bottom, a chip bowl made from 260 waste-bound Lay's potato chip bags, $40. All part of Ecoist's new Frito-Lay collection available at ecoist.com. Credit: Ecoist

Since our crusading city attorney Carmen Trutanich is yanking supersize billboards down right and left, one might wonder: What can you do with an old billboard? Plenty, as it turns out.

One enterprising company, Yak Pak, is turning old billboards into one-of-a-kind bags. There are pencil bags, camera bags, totes and messengers, all made of “upcycled” vinyl from old billboards that otherwise would end up in landfills. (Hot stat: The company says that every year in the U.S. more that 3 million billboards are sent to landfills.) To make the bags, Yak Pak partnered with TerraCycle, a business devoted to  being environmentally friendly by making products out of waste.

Yak Pak, celebrating its 20th year in business, calls the billboard bags its "most innovative product line yet."

"Yak Pak consumers are a unique, creative group and we have always mirrored their personalities in our bags," says company founder Stephen Holt. "The billboard bag collection is just another way of appreciating their individualistic nature, so with this latest collection, we offer a line where each item is an individual."

Most items in the collection sell for less than $35 and can be found at numerous retailers, including Amazon.com, Urban Outfitters, Tillys and Staples. For a complete list check out Yak Pak's website. 

And, denizens of Los Angeles, if you're looking for a way to thank Mr. Trutanich for fighting urban blight, a brand new messenger bag might be just the thing.

-- Susan Denley

Photos: A supergraphic on the bustling corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue was removed last month after the city attorney brought charges against a man accused of illegally putting up the ad. Credit: Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times. Yak Pak billboard messenger bag. Credit: Yak Pak

This week, celebrity efforts to raise money for victims of the Haiti earthquake seem to be moving into overdrive. First came reports that stars of every stripe (think Kanye West, Tony Bennett and Vince Vaughn for starters) descended on a Hollywood soundstage Monday to cut a remake of "We Are the World" to raise funds for that devastated country.

And Tuesday, we received word that actress Scarlett Johansson has designed a handbag for Spanish Mango, with all profits going to Oxfam's Haiti Earthquake Response Fund.

It's a two-fer of sorts for ScarJo -- she's not only global ambassador for the international aid and development agency, she's also currently the face of the Spanish fast-fashion brand's Spring/Summer 2010 advertising campaign.

The bag design depicts an early cartographical representation of the island nation, and the words "supporting the people of Haiti, designed by Scarlett Johansson." 

Starting March 1st, the $29.90 bags will be sold exclusively at Mango stores worldwide, including the South Coast Plaza store in Costa Mesa and Third Street Promenade shop in Santa Monica, as well as online.

-- Adam Tschorn

Retailers and Fashion Brands Do Their Part

Studio Number One''s Charity T-shirt for Haiti

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Not even Monday’s dreary weather could damper the pink, green, blue and yellow confectionery decor spilling out of the Chateau Marmont suite where British brand Mulberry showcased its spring 2010 collection. Hundreds of balloons (flown in from London, blown up in L.A.) lined the halls and walls, and candy jars filled with sweets of all sorts were stacked on almost every level surface.

The playful theme of the line’s spring collection and the room’s candyland interior are the vision of the house’s new creative director Emma Hill, who mixed her ideas of the '70s with abandoned fairgrounds and teens coming of age into the dreamy spring line.

“I was inspired by the “Virgin Suicides” and rundown fairgrounds, which gave it a sinister quality,” says Hill (who was in L.A. just for a couple of days before jetting back for the British Fashion Council Awards -- Mulberry is nominated for best accessories and best designer brand. (It's won for accessories in the past but never been nominated for best brand. Results will be announced Wednesday.) This means dresses done in a feminine print of hazy flowers called “fuzzy floral”; slightly evil horses making up the “horse head” print, which is done in a royal purple and gold; a “corsage” jacket with dozens of silver and gray rosettes plugged onto the front of a cropped jacket and lots of '70s-feeling fringe hanging from booties, bags and jackets.

 “The fringe of this jacket reminds me of those guys who ran the carnival rides, they would wear these old fringy jackets.” says Hill with a laugh.

Though the spring line shows a bit of the adolescent angst from the "Virgin Suicides," it’s a twentysomething who served as Hill’s muse for the season’s most covetable bag. The “Alexa” bag, named after MTV host and fellow Brit Alexa Chung, was inspired after the house's creative team saw Chung carrying an old Mulberry briefcase. “We saw her carrying the bag and just loved it.” says Hill, who put a more feminine spin on a slouchy briefcase shape to come up with the “Alexa.”

When she’s not designing or teaming up with Steven Meisel to shoot the brand’s campaigns, Hill loves to visit Los Angeles -- she’ll be out West in a few weeks for an “inspiration trip.” Could this mean an L.A.- inspired line to come? Her favorite haunts are the Ivy, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and Fred Segal.  “I love things that are iconic and couldn’t be anywhere else,” she says.

Another L.A. institution she loves is movies, which constantly inspire her and her collections. “My mom was obsessed with old movies, and that’s what we would do -- she’d bake a cake and we’d sit down and watch great, old movies,” says Hill, who claims to own “millions” of DVDs.  “I am always inspired by a movie. Last season, it was "Snow White." I’m classically English trained in that I start with a theme and really see it through all the way. And I do love a theme.”

The festivities from the daytime appointments carried on into the wee hours of the morning with an intimate dinner and party held in Bungalow 1 of the hotel. The balloons came downstairs from the suite, along with the candy, which seemed to fuel guests such as Kate Bosworth, who danced and giggled to songs played by DJ Daniel Lamoure. Bosworth’s ex-boyfriend, Orlando Bloom, joined her on the dance floor, swinging his jacket around his head like a lasso.

Between impromptu picture-taking, danceable tracks from The Smiths and trays of cookies sitting throughout the room, Mulberry made sure that the bunches of balloons weren’t the only bright spot on a rainy and typically quite Monday night.

-- Melissa Magsaysay

Upper photo: A runway look from Mulberry spring 2010. Credit: Mulberry

Center photo: The "Alexa" bag in nude leather with rose gold hardware. Credit: Mulberry

Lower photo: Mulberry's new creative director, Emma Hill. Credit: Mulberry

Chain-strap bags are having a definite moment. And not just the ones with interlocking "C"s on them. (Yes, Chanel made the chain-strap bag iconic, but dropping $2,000 on a satchel is a pipe dream for most.)

Lucky for us, designers of all stripes have created metal-strapped bags at various points this season. 

The design is uber-ladylike (the strap is akin to a piece of jewelry, after all), so chain-strapped bags look most modern when tempered with more casual duds, i.e. jeans and rugged boots. (Though for evening looks, chain-strap clutches dolook adorably retro '50s -- and they free your hands up for your 4-inch cigarette holder.)

A recent scouring of the Internet yielded a bevy of ingenious chain-strapped models, including the two pictured above: an orange chain-strapped lipstick bag from Rebecca Minkoff (on sale for $186.15 at Confederacy) and a green gold-strapped day bag from Marc Jacobs (on sale for $689 at Barneys New York.)

--Emili Vesilind

Photos: Orange bag by Rebecca Minoff, courtesy of Confederacy; Green bag by Marc Jacobs, courtesy of Barneys New York.

I was wandering around the garment district – the civic forces and the blue and white signs alike now call it the "fashion district," but I’ve been going there since it was just the humble garment district, so, like old friends of Cary Grant’s, I’m entitled to call it the "garment district," just as they were entitled to call him by his real name, Archie Leach.

Anyway, I’m walking around and, on Santee Street, I do a Buster Keaton double-take as I walk past one shop. Hanging in the window are handbags bearing the Cadillac logo, done up in golden metal, just as you’d find it on a big ol’ Detroit automobile grill.

I go in. There are more of them. A gold bag. A red one with racing stripes. A brown fake croc one. All of them have the Cadillac hardware and hang tags with the GM logo in the hologram pattern that bespeaks "authorized and authentic." Prices? Between $45 and $55. Who knew?

Of course I don’t buy one, any more than I’d buy an actual Cadillac.

But, hoo boy. A car maker that had to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy is also in the fashion biz?

Actually, it may make more sense for GM to make accessories than some of its vehicle lines. China -- which is where I think the purses are made -- is talking about buying the Hummer line. And I think GM made more money with its financing business than it did with its auto biz.

And as long as General Motors is for all intents and purposes owned by the United States, I think it’s fantastic that it’s branching out into fashion (if these bags are indeed authorized by GM). Dig itself out of its big old debt hole -- one gold Cadillac tote bag at a time.

-- Patt Morrison