50 square feet of Heaven - or just plain, the Coach store - allowed me to examine the bags more fully for this post, which discusses my personal favorites and runners-up for my new fall bag. (I should hire my own choir for trips to COACH.)

It’s been more hard work that was both agonizing and exhilarating. Mostly agonizing - I want, want, want. Enough complaining, and on to the list.

Soho Suede Demi Flap

In a lot of these fall bags is the new strap style of double-intermittent rings. De-lic-ious. They compliment the flap strap buckle very well, but mostly, I love a little extra design intricacy. Designers should design!

Some of these bags also have a new inner pocket set-up. There’s the standard security-zip, one slightly larger multi-function pocket, and the back lining has one really large pocket. Yumness!

The positives: Brown looks gorgeous against my coloring (dark haired/winter). The pink version looks rich. The price tag is a very nice $198. It’s perfectly sized at roughly 10 x 5 x 2.

The negatives: Suede is likely to get worn, and this bag is almost entirely made of the natural leather. The top is a little rigid-looking. (And I’m not really going to count lack of signature, nope, nope, nope. I have one signature bag, so it’s fine. I’m all for grown-up, sophisticated, merely-about-quality designer. Yes.)

Mini Signature Demi Flap

Here is an example of the poor photographers this season for the Coach catalogue. I edited this image drastically to show you a color more similar to the one in the store. I love this purple. It matches one of my favorite cardigans. It’s a great, dark fall color.

It’s in mini signature, which I’m feeling for its more subtle qualities. I’m growing. (My current bag is in [large] Signature, so a difference would be nice.)

It has the nice size, the nice pockets, and the nice price, but the suede is on the bottom. This worries me. The bottom is the part of the bag that needs the most protecting. It’s what touches dirty “cash wrap” counters in stores. Granted, the full-suede bags still have it there (and suede is big for fall 2005 Coach).

Soho Demi Flap

Bordeaux! Oh, the color. It’s actually a little more purple in person. It’s the best mix of the two above purses. It has all the niceness, without any suede.

What I love the most about this bag is the contrast stitch detail; there are three seams along the bottom and each gets bolder pink as they wrap down. It looks fab.

These reasons make this my 1st choice. But it doesn’t win the grand prize, I’ve saved the best for last.

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