From Paris to Seoel, the coolest bag of the hour is Belgian. The brand: Jeune Premier.
Hélène Fransen designed the first model at her kitchen table in Ostend, because she couldn’t find anything she liked for her son Ralph. That was in 2012. For the coming school year, the company has sold over 100.000 schoolbags. Children like the colors, but parents prefer quality. So does Hélène Fransen. But she wasn’t impressed by what was on offer at the other end of the spectrum: boring, heavy leather bags.
Still, she needed a bag for her toddler, so she designed one herself. “It was a lambskin bag with a mushroom and Ralph’s name on it. Four mothers and the principal came up to her on that first day of school to tell her they loved the bag, and to ask her where they could buy it.
Her husband Bruno Piers pushed her further. Why not create four different designs and commercialize them? That year, they sold eighty schoolbags. They launched the first collection in April 2012, followed five months later by the creation of the company. The brand Jeune Premier was born.
