It’s not easy to get to the factory where Louis Vuitton’s Speedy P9 is made. First, you must board a train from Paris to Rennes. (That is, assuming you’re already in Paris.) Then, you must take a car from the station in Rennes to a remote location on the border between Brittany and Normandy. As you approach, you catch sight of the building, with a distant view of the iconic Saint-Michel on a clear day. There, more than 800 artisans craft the iconic bag. Jacob Elordi carries one. So does LeBron James.
Originally named the Express, the Speedy bag was created in 1930 as an alternative to LV’s bulky trunks. Its squishability made sense for commercial flights, which were becoming more common at the time. The 30 cm model was popular enough that Vuitton expanded the line to include 35 and 40 cm options. In the 1960s, Audrey Hepburn asked the house to create a smaller version, Louis Vuitton obliged, and the 25 cm appeared on Hepburn’s arm, launching the bag and its various sizes to cult status.
After Marc Jacobs famously reimagined the Speedy, collaborating with artists such as Takashi Murakami and Yayoi Kusama, Pharrell Williams picked up the mantle for his debut collection in June 2023. Bright incarnations in red, blue, yellow, and green were paraded up and down the iconic Pont Neuf, which inspired the latest iteration’s name. (While Pont Neuf translates to “new bridge,” neuf also means “nine.”) The Speedy P9 is now synonymous with Williams’ tenure as Men’s Creative Director, cemented by a campaign that featured a pregnant Rihanna.
Made from screen-printed leather, the P9 features a slouchy silhouette with a lambskin lining, a removable pouch, a leather name tag, and a key bell. The bag also comes in a millionaire’s version: crocodile leather, real gold details, and a more-than-8,000-carat diamond-studded padlock. My visit to the atelier focused on the humble, regular P9 — created in a limited edition and only available via waitlist.
At Rennes train station, a sleek, black Mercedes-Benz V-Class was waiting for me and a group of Louis Vuitton Men’s employees. On the car ride, while whizzing past fields of cows and sheep, the employees told me that the house typically invites press to the better-known trunk atelier in Asnières, which showcases its more aesthetic process. It’s rare, they said, for the brand to open the doors to any other factory.
The tour started with a chance to try my hand at leathermaking. In theory, it’s simple enough to emboss a border on a piece of tan leather. In practice, my lines were crooked, with forbidden crossed edges at the corners. This was fun because I was hopeless but happy to get involved, and because it prepared me to appreciate the demonstration of skill that lay ahead.
The Speedy P9’s journey begins with a leather inspector named David, who painstakingly examines each of the three types needed for the bag: calf for the exterior, lambskin for the interior, and cowhide for the straps and handles. The leather undergoes at least 100 processes at various partner factories around the world before arriving here. David checks the overall texture, grain, brilliance, and color against a master piece. Once approved, the leather is again examined visually and by hand for faults or scars hidden by tanning.
While many of the components of the Speedy P9 are handmade, the body of the bag is cut by an advanced laser machine. It then takes 240 steps to assemble the pieces into the recognizable shape of a Speedy P9. Spread out before me like a 2010 influencer’s flat-lay, the myriad parts of the puzzle impress the precision and attention to detail that the bag’s creation requires. The piping, handles, shoulder straps, and small details are all stitched by hand, including an Easter egg hidden behind a tab on the side: a tiny embossed animal. Each year, Williams chooses a new talisman; past designs include a dove, a goat, a frog, a lion, a fox, a turtle, and 2025’s lobster.
In French, craftspeople are often referred to as les petites mains, or “the small hands” — a synecdoche that I believe does a disservice to the multifaceted artisans at the Louis Vuitton atelier. Each has studied their particular skill for years. They have a range of backgrounds; Delphine, who hand-embosses and stitches the P9’s leather handles and trims, used to work in healthcare. Beyond the expert stitching, punching, knotting, and glueing, one of the most impressive moments of the tour is when a machine-sewing specialist named Céline, who has worked for the maison for 18 years and on the P9 for the past two, performs a blind stitch at the top of the bag. If done incorrectly, the maneuver compromises the whole design, condemning it to the recycle pile. With a smile and not a hint of stress, she executes the stitch in seconds. The whole process drives home the reason the bag is produced in small quantities: It takes time and a lot of skilled people to make a Speedy P9.
After the tour and lunch featuring regional delicacies such as Bretagne butter, scallops, and lobster, in typical Brittany fashion, it started to rain. I was ferried to Rennes in the late, gray afternoon to catch my train home. As I was chauffeured back through Paris to my apartment in the 18th Arrondissement, I caught a glimpse of the Pont Neuf, brilliant in the dark.
