Designed in a Paris studio, Polène’s pieces are built from strap to stitch in the rocky Andalusian city of Ubrique, Spain. Known for its upmarket tanneries, the region has attracted the most prestigious purveyors of fashion, although you’ll hear no name-dropping here. Polène is known for wielding leather in one-of-a-kind ways, creating bags that are basically sculptures— inspired but not limited by their medium. The region’s craftspeople have a masterful understanding of leather, intuiting its vast potential as well as its constraints, which leads to products that move in exactly the right ways. Here, the art of leather work has been handed down through the generations—all the way back to the days of the Roman Empire.
In the beginning, Polène employed a modest roster of 10 craftspeople, but it now has a staff of 2,200 and has become a major player in the leather-goods arena thanks to its accessible high-quality-bag offering. While other big names opt to price gouge, the Mothays believe in democratizing luxury. For instance, their Numéro Un handbag was first marketed in 2016 and remains a bestseller today. Why? Most likely because of the carefree Parisian elegance it imparts at the comparatively reasonable price of $580. That said, Polène isn’t relying on its Frenchness, as seen by its campaigns featuring minimalist, desert-like vibes. Polène’s visual universe is more akin to the arid mountain landscape of Andalusia or salt flats, as wide as the horizon, somewhere in South America.