Coach; Chelsea Jia Feng/BI
Throughout the early aughts, my purse of choice was a brown wristlet covered in monogram Cs.
The wallet-sized bag was, of course, from Coach — or at least designed to look like it was. (I'm pretty sure my aunt bought it from a street vendor in New York City.) But the accessory's impact was all the same.
Whenever I pulled a few dollars out of my imitation bag to buy a candy bar or CD, I felt like Paris Hilton and the other celebrities I'd read about in teen magazines.
Unfortunately, the brand had lost most of its appeal by the time I reached adulthood and could afford a real Coach purse. Its famous letter pattern looked especially outdated.