Not long ago, a certain kind of handbag did all the talking in China’s urban centers. It was loud, logoed, and heavy with connotations: not just what you owned, but who you hoped others would think you were. These days, the mood has shifted. Look around any metro in Beijing or Shanghai and you’ll spot a quieter trend: bags with clean silhouettes and no nameplate in sight. Most are made by domestic brands, designed to carry more than just cachet.
There’s a story in this shift. It mirrors the path taken by Chinese cosmetics brands a few years ago. Back then, new labels rose on the strength of ingredient transparency and factory overlap with foreign giants—touting that they were made in the same plants as your favorite global serum. Handbag makers now seem to be recycling the same blueprint—but aiming higher. Rather than carve out affordable niches, they are looking to rewrite the rules of luxury.
Songmont, Dissona, Qiuzhen, Grotto, Kunogigi—names that once sounded fringe—are now climbing fast. These brands package utility and tactility with a sheen of philosophy. They pitch their wares not just as stylish, but as sensible. A Songmont tote might come with copy that details the number of leather processing steps or the hand-dyeing techniques used to achieve a muted tone. A Qiuzhen satchel boasts water-dyed, untreated leather that absorbs life’s wear, transforming every stain into a personal patina:
There’s also a deliberate absence: logos. Many of these bags lean hard into minimalism, offering large compartments and soft finishes that appeal to buyers turned off by maximalist branding. In a consumer landscape where getting “caught” with a dupe signals inauthenticity, many women are choosing to perform taste differently: not by flexing luxury’s surface, but by signaling insider knowledge and independent style.
To make this pitch stick, storytelling matters. That’s why so many of these brands reach backward to move forward. Songmont’s founding tale begins with a former Google designer and her mother, who handmade the brand’s first bags at home in Shanxi. Dissona brought on former Hermes craftsman Thomas Maurice and became the first Chinese leather goods label to show at Milan Fashion Week in 2017, according to China Daily. Kunogigi nods to its co-founder’s grandmother and her legacy of handweaving. These origin stories do more than generate feel-good buzz—they function as soft power and brand ballast.
That power is now going global. During Paris Fashion Week in 2024, Songmont set up a pop-up store, as reported by China Daily, echoing the aesthetic priorities of heritage brands. Its storefronts in China are likewise increasingly experiential. The Chengdu IFS location channels a bamboo valley; its space on Shanghai’s Huaihai Road mimics the curves of mountain winds. In Shenzhen, the store draws from ocean wave patterns. All this places Chinese brands not just as underdogs, but as design peers—especially when they share a mall floor with international houses.
For many shoppers in China, the RMB 1,000 (USD 140) price tag—a line once crossed only for foreign labels—is no longer a dealbreaker. In fact, it may have become a threshold for quality. The shift is partly practical: why spend on a knockoff that might betray you when an equivalent from a well-made local brand costs the same—or less? But it’s also partly ideological. As China’s affluent professionals grow weary of luxury’s more obvious symbols, domestic brands have emerged as discreet alternatives to logo-heavy imports, while younger buyers gravitate toward offbeat labels like Grotto for freshness and flair.
And the numbers reflect the shift. According to Chanmofang data, seven of the top 15 handbag brands priced above RMB 1,000 (USD 140) on Tmall as of February 2025 were domestic. Songmont and Qiuzhen ranked second and third, behind only Coach.
That doesn’t mean the climb is guaranteed. As some of these brands rise, they face an ironic twist: they are now being copied—not just in spirit, but stitch for stitch. Online, side-by-side reviews compare originals to “superfakes” that sell for a fraction of the price. Some buyers swear by the difference, citing softer leathers, better colors, and cleaner construction. But others don’t see the point. If the gap is slim, is it really worth paying several times more?
This tension mirrors what happened with domestic beauty brands. When hype gets too far ahead of product strength, customer trust falters. Complaints around hardware quality, fading leathers, or stitching flaws have already surfaced. In a space where one bad batch can go viral, scale can become a liability. These brands have told intimate stories—now they need to prove they can deliver consistency at volume.
They are doing it at a precarious moment. The global luxury market is shrinking. A study co-released by Bain & Company and Fondazione Altagamma estimates that global luxury goods sales contracted by 2% in 2024, dropping to EUR 1.48 trillion (USD 1.6 trillion). Nearly 50 million customers have exited the market over the past two years. Many are younger buyers squeezed by inflation or simply fatigued by luxury’s pricing games. HSBC’s “Cruel Summer” report flagged this softness months earlier, when it revised 2024’s growth forecast to just 2.8%.
With traditional players doubling down on scarcity and price hikes—some luxury handbags have risen over 50% in cost since 2019, according to HSBC—Chinese brands have a clear window. Not as bargain alternatives, but as legitimate contenders with their own aesthetic codes. And they are doing so as trade winds shift again. In the backdrop is a growing conversation about tariffs and reshoring, which may end up spotlighting domestic producers even more. If friction between China and the West reroutes supply chains, some Chinese brands could benefit not just from origin stories—but from being the origin.
Some are already leaning in. Songmont, for instance, has tapped a diverse roster of public figures to reflect its image back to consumers: Wen Qi for vigor, Li Na for ambition, Kelly Rutherford for elegance. The approach seems deliberately patchworked, nodding to varied definitions of success. Each one functions as a living moodboard, embodying a facet of the brand’s evolving identity.
But the real test is subtler. Can these brands keep solving real user problems—offering beauty, utility, and longevity—while convincing buyers that they are not just good for the price, but good, full stop? Can a Chinese handbag brand make someone pause in New York, London, or Tokyo and ask, “Where did you get that?”
The next chapter of China’s fashion story isn’t just about making bags that last. It’s about making belief stick.