You’d have thought it was a movie premiere, with the hoopla converging outside midtown Manhattan's Hammerstein Ballroom. But inside, despite the celebrity presence, the real star was a handbag.
Not just any handbag, but the "Baguette" ubiquitous Fendi bag created 25 years ago and named for long French loaf of bread and the way it, too, is carried under the arm of discerning buyer.
The Fendi show on Friday night was a big birthday party for the bag and its long-lasting claim to pop-culture fame.
But why New York, when Fendi usually shows in Italy? The bag had early success and pop-culture resonance in New York, most memorably immortalized in a 2000 episode of "Sex and the City,"
when a mugger had the temerity to try to take one from Carrie Bradshaw when he apparently didn't know what it was called.
"Gimme your bag," the thug in the alley demanded. "It's a baguette!" Carrie admonished him as he made off with her shiny purple version.
It's safe to say everyone knew their bags from their baguettes on Friday night, when about 600 people packed into the ballroom
-- some on the main floor and others in high balcony seating -- to celebrate the bag and its many iterations over the years.