BUCKLE Up

The ACCESSORY is no longer just for HOLDING your PANTS UP. Sometimes it's NOT EVEN for PANTS at all.

THE SWEDISH BRAND Hodakova loves a belt but doesn't sell a belt.

If you want to buy a belt by the buzzy label, worn by celebrities like Cate Blanchett and Greta Lee, you'll need to buy multiples, and you can't wear them with your pants either. Instead, they're stitched together to form a bag or a dress or a shirt. Hodakova sells what it considers "converted goods": luxury items constructed from repurposed materials-belts that aren't really belts.

When I first saw the Hodakova baguette bag, made to order out of six different belts, with bulky silver buckles that protrude from the side and clank up against one another, I wanted it instantly. I've never been one for belts, but a bag made of belts? That was up my alley. It's the kind of piece that makes people stop you on the street. It has the look of something created from a wild imagination and not conceived of with marketing and sales goals in mind.

It follows that the brand's founder, Ellen Hodakova Larsson, who won the prestigious LVMH Prize in September, trained first as a sculptor before designing clothing. "Fashion hasn't been my main interest," she says. "I think it's more the mindset of the actual piece that I'm interested in, how you're valuing this piece as something other than clothes."

Belts don't get much shine in the fashion universe. The thought of funky low-rise pants divides generations. Square-toe boots are the subject of hotly contested are-theyfun-or-are-they-ugly debates. Every year, new bags contend for It status.

But belts are just...kinda...belts? No one is making viral TikToks about them; no one is really thinking much about them at all. Poor belts. It's kind of sad when you think about it.

From top: Alexander McQueen, Spring 1999; Maison Martin Margiela Artisanal, Fall 2006; Bella Hadid; Chloe King in a Kate Hundley top; Junya Watanabe, Spring 2003