Add Bling to Your Bag with Texas Designer Amanda Marcuson’s Cool and Quirky Vintage Charm Collection

As Labubus (those furry Takashi Murakami-esque key rings) reign as the fashionista’s accessory of choice, there’s no better time to add some pop to your Prada with a unique clip-on charm. Dallas-based designer Amanda Marcuson has built a burgeoning career helping clients do just that. Launched last summer, her quirkily named Bag Crap line was founded when Marcuson found a surprising demand for the kitschy keychains she was attaching to her high-end bags.

A former luxury accessories specialist for The Real Real and Heritage Auctions, Marcuson had spent years curating the finest purses in the world for resale, building an enviable collection of her own along the way. Yet carrying a Birkin to work while dressed in a suit didn’t feel authentically her, so she sought to add some humor to her look by adding a few homemade keychains.

“(At Heritage), I was working with $50,000 to $100,00 bags,” Marcuson recalls. “When I was there for a year, I started to get into bag charms because I felt I needed some kind of creative outlet. I’m a very unserious person: I take my job seriously, but I need something to be funny or lighthearted, so I started crafting on the side and turning these old McDonald’s toys into bag charms. I think the first one was a rollerblading Barbie with a squirt gun and a Koosh ball — it felt like a better representation of myself.”

The 35-year-old Detroit native comes by her knack for crafting naturally. Marcuson started selling beaded bracelets as a child, eventually helping her mom auction Teenie Beanie Babies on eBay during the site’s early days. Intent on scoring her first designer bag at age 13, she managed to turn stuffed animal sales into a Chloe Paddington. Trading that for a Louis Vuitton Murakami and then a Prada Pochette, Marcuson taught herself how to authenticate designer goods. She decided to attend the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York with the hope of landing a gig as a buyer at a department store.

Post-graduation, Marcuson was hired as an accessories market assistant at Allure magazine, where she learned the ins and outs of pricing and materials, even launching a short-lived side hustle making gummy bear jewelry for clients like Katy Perry.

After the assistants at the magazine were laid off, Marcuson decided to relocate to Scottsdale, Arizona, to work for the luxury consignment store To Be Continued, a job that eventually led her to Dallas and her position at Heritage. As she styled her daily outfits, she always added something from her growing collection of vintage keychains.

“All these designer houses like Balenciaga and Miu Miu started to push bag charms as the next trend,” she explains. “I thought if I’m going to put a bunch of junk on my bag, I want it to be my own, and my bags started getting compliments; then people started asking where they could buy the charms.”

Soon, the budding entrepreneur built up a social media following on Instagram (@shopbagcrap, with 17k followers). But it was a post of tchotchkes hanging off her XL Hermes HAC Birkin 45cm that led Marcuson to decide it was time to quit her day job.

“I put a ton of charms on there — Teletubbies, Barbie. I wouldn’t wear it like that, but it went super viral, and that was the bait; having this absurdly large Birkin and covering it with all this stuff catches people’s attention.”

Officially launching her website last August, Marcuson now spends her days working out of her North Dallas home office, sourcing, scrubbing, and curating Happy Meal toys and miniature food, and transforming deadstock finds. A photographer spotted a group of her charms at Copenhagen Fashion Week, which prompted Vogue to reach out to cover her line.

Marcuson says she has customers from all over the world, including Dubai, Los Angeles, New York, London, and Japan, and celebrities like Tracee Ellis Ross and Lily Allen proudly wear Bag Crap. Pieces retail for $20 for a plush clip-on up to $250 for a custom set, and Marcuson offers weekly website drops of small, one-of-a-kind finds on Fridays at 8 pm EST.

As every house from Louis Vuitton to Loewe, Gucci to Coach continues to embrace the bag charm trend, Marcuson doesn’t see it drying up any time soon. Still, she is diversifying by offering shoe charms and adding higher-end materials, such as gold-filled and sterling hardware, to the mix. Her biggest goal (and challenge) is to continue discovering the most obscure trinkets to dress up the “it” bags of the future.

“I know for sure people love Snoopy, Power Puff Girls, and the Simpsons, but if you can find a really obscure cartoon from the ’90s and make it into a charm, they love it,” the designer says of her customers. “The nostalgia bit is even more significant than the trend. I’m like, if you’re going to wear a Labubu, then why not a silly little troll doll? I feel like people just need a pick-me-up, and that has value, too.”

Shop Bag Crap here.