Luxury, Loved Longer: The Story Behind The Handbag Room

Established in 2013, The Handbag Room began with a moment of clarity at 30,000 feet. Working in the corporate world at Carsales.com.au, founder Courtney was time poor, constantly travelling between Adelaide and Melbourne, and repeatedly frustrated by the lack of quality repair options for her designer shoes and handbags. On one of those short domestic flights, worn heels at her feet and a growing sense that luxury deserved better care, the concept for a specialist restoration business took shape.

That idea became Sole Service, a business built on the belief that high-end accessories should be repaired with the same level of craftsmanship with which they were made. Over the next five years, Courtney refined the art of restoration, working extensively with luxury shoes, handbags and leather accessories. What began as a service for individual clients soon expanded into enterprise partnerships, with Sole Service managing national repair programs for brands including Furla, Mimco, Saben and Hugo Boss.

As the business grew, so did Courtney’s understanding of the realities of restoration at scale. The work is highly skilled, labour-intensive and mentally demanding. Despite the success of Sole Service, Courtney recognised the need to evolve. She made the deliberate decision to rebrand and reconfigure the business model, narrowing the focus to designer handbags and building a more considered approach to luxury care and resale.

The Handbag Room emerged with a clear purpose. Specialising in handbag restoration, including cleaning, recolouring and edge repair, the business expanded to include a dedicated consignment and valuation department. Guided by the philosophy Luxury, Loved Longer, the brand now sits at the intersection of craftsmanship, resale and circular fashion.

Today, Courtney is a strong advocate for restore over replace. She believes a designer handbag is rarely finished when one owner is ready to move on. Through restoration and resale, its story simply changes hands, extending the life of materials designed to last and supporting a more thoughtful approach to luxury consumption.