okay gals...I've been away too long, and while I dont have any new MJ bag purchases to speak of, I must say (and i think I've said this before) that i just constantly fall back in love with my taupe stam when i use it.

i recently took her out from being stored away for quite some time, and it's such a LOVE bag! The leather is just delicious, the versatility of the way you can carry the bag, lovely....okay, I think I'm having de ja vu or something because I think I've gushed about my stam before on here...but I just cant help myself and I know you gals understand!

I thought it'd be fun to tell our stories on here and express how much we love our stams!

and of course: PICTURES!!!

Well HELLO, where are your pictures???

PICS PLEASE

I will say I love my Dark Grey Stam which I haven't rec'd yet but have been in desperate search for over the last while (see other thread!).... I am sure I will be even more in love when I get in IRL!

okay...sorry gals, had some erands to run this morning and ran out before writing my story to add to this thread, so here it goes:

Way back in 2005 I received my issue of vogue in the mail one day. I flipped through it as I usually did, a lazy hot summer afternoon, looking with particular interest at the bags, as I had recently become a member of Thefashionspot.com...Calmly turning the pages of what I recall to be the september issue, I got to a spread featuring Karen Elson in 1930's equestrian clothing in yummy autumn colors of burnt oranges, rusts and olive greens...flip....She had some great curly, crazy hair and I was thinking to myself how she kept it so red....when I got to this picture:

I immediately dog-eared the page, and logged into my newfound fashion forum: desperately posting babble in the Chanel forum as I thought first thing that this had to be Chanel. (My knowledge at the time was even more-than ignorant to bag names and brands, and boy has that changed!)

I typed away frantically in my chicken scratch, trying desperately to describe this bag and the magazine, hoping someone else knew what I was babbling about. A kind mod moved my post from the 'chanel' forum to the 'marc jacobs' forum and my infatuation with the bag took off like a rocket. I started inquiring about everything and thank god there were gals already on top of this bag, filling me in on the price and availability and all these things about designer bags that i had no clue about.

At that point and time, I was lost to the bag. I was determining methods of action on how to make lots of cash real fast and real quick. I was a college student at the time, I worked a crappy minimum wage job, and I dont think designer bags had really appealed to me before the stam. I think at the time i had a coach bag or two, but they were the more avant guard stylings of their new limited edition design series: the ocean fringe bag, the antiqued top-handle bag, I had had my eye on their ocelot bags too...the basic styles just didn't really appeal to me. I suppose I should disclose that I am the quirky artsy type chick too, and had a run-in with the team of Doooney and Bourke & Coach manufacturers that left a bad taste in my mouth. I won a contest, had a lil trip to europe, found out the owner of Dooney & Bourke was something I depised, and that not only was Coach D&B's direct competition, they were better too. It was my form of rebellion, buying Coach because I hated everything Dooney stood for from my experience. But now there was this whole Marc Jacobs guy now...and OMG was that Stam bag amazing!

I soon thought of ways to make money and every single one I came up with was no way going to make near enough to even think about a Stam. (Of course selling organs or eggs was an option, but I'd rather not have spawn running around for the the sake of a handbag or lost organs....... or would i??? ahahahah kidding! I'm seriously kidding!)

I lusted and posted and lusted and sighed and daydreamed and became utterly obsessed with this bag. At the time, an opportunity arose as the result of a long legal battle in regards to my dad's health. My dad allotted me and my brothers one luxury item each, and I had been lusting over this bag, oggling it on NM.com and Bergdorfs for at least a month. My dad mentioned if i wanted to order the bag, that I could and I could hardly believe the situation. I had never dreamed of actually getting the bag, and at the same time, I had never even had the desire to purchase anything relatively that expensive EVER in my entire life! I shopped at Ross, Target, antique and vintage stores, and had a few small shopping sprees in Italy and got my first designer items: a prada croco bracelet and boots. I live in a small town, Coach and LV were considered the holy-grail of bags, and even Doooney was 'up-there'. It was all new to me and I felt like I was going to have a coronary when I went to that page on Bergdorf's knowing I was going to do it: I was going to order this baby with some fast as hell express shipping and actually get this bag!

After some drama about the bag being the last available in the store and me ordering on a friday, causing my overnight shipping to be a bit more like 5 day shipping, it came. When that HUGE brown box arrived at the door and I got my first glimpse of that textured silver gift box and felt for the first time, the weight and size of a marc jacobs bag, I was truely in love.

I was so scared to touch it, and so amazed that a bag could cost so much, but it was like nothing else. I got my bag right before the 'great sell-out' of the stam....months before the popularity hit and celebs were scene all over town with the bag. The exclusivity of the icey leather, the stories we traded about the rare and elusice petrol and violet, all the stories and all the posts created such an amazing community of stam lovers. Right about 2006 I found out about the purseforum and the stam lovers here. I had become a bit of an expert on authenticating the bags by that time and helped a few gals out on here with stams, which created a whole new venue to share my stam obsession with. There was an article in the new york times i believe months and months later in regards to the stam bag and the fashion forum members who were obsessed with the bag, and I was' the gal whose pics got stolen for a ebay auction'. So much drama, so much fun, all for a bag. But WHAT a bag!!!!

and so that's my story...had to share it eventually. and everytime i use my bag, it makes me smile...

Great story! You even remember the ad you saw it first! I have to sleep over and will try to remember how I find out about the stam bag the first time (it is already a long time ago - but I haven't been in a state to spend that much of money before as I was still a student back there - and also concentrated more on clothes...). If I remember I will post tomorrow. Good night!

I am hopelessly infected by the stam bag virus. Crazy me is already spending 2 weeks watching stam bags on the internet now.

you've got the bug!!! once bitten, the stam bug is only remedied with a lovely bag...

none of my other bags garner as much attention as my stam does. it's truly stunning! the quilting, the chain, the frame, the kisslock! i mean, what's not to love about it? i used to own two, but i only have one now: my berry stam. my icy bordeaux is with my mother. the two colors were similar enough that i had to somehow justify being able to buy another, so i figured if i gave the bordeaux to my mother, i could purchase the berry without having to permanently get rid of one of the first mj i ever bought AND be a generous daughter. ha! anyway, i cannot wait for the fall 08 bags. i need that pleated stam with the brushed silver hardware.

Nothing compares to a stam. I never thought I would be one of those girls who had the same bag in more than one color. . .but then I met the stam. Now I want to just keep collecting. I think I need another classic quilted at some point. Maybe someday I will happen upon on with sude interior and/or icy leather.

I'm excited about the new ones with the silver hardware too. I can't wait to see them IRL.

Oh man, I could gush over the stam all day. I love seeing it's elgant shape hanging in my office when I'm at work.