Smythson of Bond Street

This article is from 2006 and is archived. We have since become a fully cruelty-free publication and no longer publicize leather products.

Chances are you’ve already heard of Smythson of Bond Street. Almost since their inception in 1887, they have been creating products for the Royal Family including Queen Elizabeth and the Prince of Wales, among other clients such as Esteé Lauder. Their products are known worldwide for being the epitome of quality when it comes to leather books and stationery.

As we opened the big brown shipping box from Smythson of Bond Street, it became obvious that we had something especially luxurious in our hands. Elegantly wrapped, we pulled out and admired the beautiful thick blue boxes that contained a selection of their signature products. We were more than happy to try them all–here’s what we found:

Patent Makeup Bag

If anyone knows how hard it can be to find the perfect makeup bag, it’s us. So when we took Smythson’s baby blue makeup bag ($110.) to Paris we were pleasantly surprised to find that it contained the perfect amount of space to neatly hold all our essentials. The bag has elegance with attitude and looks great on any bathroom counter. A great find for any beauty junkie!

Visitors Book

Smythson’s goatskin leather Visitor’s Book ($330.) comes with either feint ruled columns for date, name and address or with their traditional plain watermarked paper, both with gold tooling. We picked the plain paper version and found that instead of just leaving their name and the date (as people often do in guest books), visitors actually drew little pictures and faces with talk bubbles, made jokes and basicaly filled up entire pages. It became reminiscent of the autograph books or highschool yearbook autograph pages that we had so much fun with when we were young. For some reason the watermarked pages look so beautiful that people couldn’t resist thinking up something creative to write on them – and to go down in history (or at least this books history – which I imagine will be a long one.)

Bond Street Organizer

This stunning loose-leaf organizer ($360.) is lined in black calf leather, has pockets for cards, a pen-loop and a gilt propelling pencil. With week-to-view diary section, notes, address pages and dividers all in blue medium-weight paper edged in gold, the pages have just the right amount of space to fit in all your meetings and events. There are more than enough address book and note pages to make this the only book you will ever need to bring with you. Available in black, tan or red pigskin, this obviously gorgeous organizer will no doubt bring many compliments for you, as it did for us almost every time we used it in public.

Health & Beauty Notes

This lightweight note book ($55.) has thin blue pages divided into indexed sections for makeup, skin care, treatments, hair, diets and other beauty essentials. With a cute blue cover to match, and the words “Health & Beauty Notes” inscribed in silver on the cover, this book is the ultimate indulgence for the quintessential beauty queen.

Five Year Diary

When we took a look at this luxurious book ($230.), the word ‘heirloom’ came to mind. The Smythson five year diary is bound in black goatskin leather with silk endpaper edged with gold. We got the impression that this book might not only last five years, but fifty! Each thick, white page has a date at the top and is feint ruled with 5 heavier lines to divide the pages for 5 years of memoirs. So the next time you wonder what you were doing this time last year–or five years ago–now you can have the answer!

Purple Patent Photo Album

This shiny purple patent leather photo album ($240.) has thick, acid-free white pages with silver tooling (that means when you shut the album the pages look silver.) The comments that we got were that album is clearly high quality but is such a shiny patent that it could easily fool someone into mistakenly thinking that it’s not leather. Nevertheless, we found that it was a fun yet elegant addition to any coffee table — and visitors couldn’t help but pick it up. Which, of course, is great when you want to show off your latest trip to St. Moritz. Bonus: you can even have it silver-stamped with “Fin in St. Moritz” on the cover.

Slim Travel Wallet

As any frequent flier knows, a good 旅行 wallet is essential. It has, on numerous occasions, prevented me from either misplacing my passport and ticket or simply having to dig around in both of my carry-on bags to find one or the other. Well, thanks to Smythson’s travel wallet ($260. US) I can keep my passport, foreign currency, boarding pass and itinerary all in one place. We much preferred the slim travel wallet to the deluxe travel wallet because the streamlined slim version can easily fit into your jacket’s inside pocket or into an already jam-packed purse. Bellissimo!

Little Black Book

This tiny book ($35.) is perfect for those on-the-go. Sure to fit into any back pocket or even the smallest purse, the appropriately named “Little Black Book” is an essential for everyone from social butterflies to business people. The thin, lightweight pages make this small book fun and compact with just the right amount of space for even the most popular girl on the block.