celine – BRYOLOGUE

Winter in South Korea – Day 4: Simone Handbag Museum

January 17, 2013bryologue 7 Comments

*extremely picture-heavy post*

For our last day in Seoul, we already have our itinerary in set and it was non-negotiable for us not to go to one of my must-see places. Back in October 2012, I previously expressed my anticipation of visiting Simone Handbag Museum and I could not believe that I finally had the chance to go and visit it. It was very uncommon for tourists to include a bag museum to their travel itineraries but I consider it a sin for sort-of bag lovers like myself not to drop by when in Seoul. So from Myeongdong Station, we travelled all the way to Sinsa station in the upscale Gangnam-gu to visit the museum (directions to this place can be found at the end of this post).

Simone Handbag Museum’s building in Gangnam-gu

Rainy winter - me on the bright side, while Mon in his neutral ensemble ---- and I love out transparent umbrellas we bought for only KRW 3,500!

Rainy winter – me on the bright side, while Mon in his neutral ensemble —- and I love our transparent umbrellas we bought for only KRW 3,500!

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Looking forward to seeing bag heaven: the Simone Handbag Museum

October 22, 2012bryologue 1 Comment

Mon and are currently drafting our itinerary for our trip to Seoul this December, and we both agree that there will be no palace tour. We have only visited two of the Five Grand Palaces in Seoul built during the Joseon Dynasty (i.e. Gyeongbokgung and Changdeokgung, the latter was very near the place we stayed in), but we think that we have seen enough. =) We also agreed on Nami Island and Neverland because we did not see those places during our last visit. But one MAJOR destination, at least for me, to be visited will be the recently-built museum in the Gangnam area: the Simone Handbag Museum. It is NOT normally what tourists tend to visit and flock over, but as a person who loves bags, I really want to check it out.

(Photo from http://simonehandbagmuseum.co.kr/collection.php)

Visiting this place is non-negotiable, even if we have to walk quite a distance just to reach the place. the admission fee is 5,000 won, which isn’t bad at all, given that I will have the chance to see interestingly crafted bags way back from 16th century until contemporary period. And speaking of the more recent period, any bag lover can immediately identify wonderful pieces from “The Collection” page from their website. You can see the McQueen Union Jack clutch, a Kelly and a Birkin, a Fendi baguette (hello Carrie!), a Gucci bamboo top-handle, a vintage Moschino dripping chocolate, a Chanel Cambon tote, a Prada nylon backpack, Louis Vuitton bags, Missoni, Céline and Ferragamo.

But the question is, when can we squeeze the time to visit it? I proposed visiting the museum on our first day, mere hours after we landed, but I guess Mon won’t be too happy to go straight away to Apgujeong just to visit it. LOL But this time, I won’t be leaving Seoul without buying a bag. I’ve been wanting a canvas and/or leather backpack with a style similar to the one below, and as this type of bag looks popular in Seoul now, I will definitely look for one.

(Photo from upashion.com)

Update:

I finally got to visit Simone Handbag Museum last December 2012! See my entry about it here:

https://bryologue.com/2013/01/17/winter-in-seoul-2012-day-4-simone-handbag-museum/

Monday Blues

October 15, 2012bryologue 1 Comment

I have received an email last week from our HR, instructing us to come in business casual for a shoot. O_O Well, since I’d be celebrating my fifth year in the company this December, I was included in the list of people who’d be getting one of those company-associated Charriol bracelets.

"Céline blue" from Vogue Paris' Facebook page

Anyway, I immediately thought of wearing something I’ve never worn before and I call it “Céline blue” because I’ve seen this wonderful street style photo by Tommy Ton (I think) from Paris Fashion Week last month. I like how bright and vibrant the color was and I was up for anything to combat the dreary Monday.

I don’t usually wear a necktie and I always find myself Google-ing ‘windsor knot’ or ‘half-windsor knot’ whenever I was about to wear one. The photo above pretty much shows my ineptitude in doing one.

Also, we were to wear a hat in one of the photos because the idea was “Hats off to you!” or something because we allowed the company to (~~enslave us for half a decade and more, just kidding~~) be our home for a long time. I immediately thought that guys would have fedoras and baseball caps as their default hats. Of course, I didn’t want to wear something similar to them, so we searched the Halloween costume sections last Saturday for a top hat because I had the Mad Hatter from Tim Burton’s ‘Alice in Wonderland‘ in mind. But the closest thing we found was not so tall at all and I just bought things to make it look less severe.

It took me more than two hours to make my hat but it just took me about five minutes to have my pictures taken. We were also to record a video, answering questions such as lessons learned from my stay in the company. But as my knee-jerk answers were best left on my mind, I just opted not to record mine. I’d rather be true to myself than be all-Dove-like-testimony-advertisement about it.