New, Unworn and Pre-Owned Hermès Scarves & Silks · London

The carré is the object that made Hermès a house of pictures as well as leather. The first one was printed in 1937 — Jeu des Omnibus et Dames Blanches, taken from a woodblock design — and the format has not changed since: ninety centimetres square, silk twill, hems rolled and stitched by hand.

The making is the part worth understanding, because it explains the price. Each colour in a design needs its own engraved screen, and a complex carré can carry thirty or more. The screens are drawn by hand, the silk is printed in Lyon one colour at a time with drying between passes, and a single design can take many months from drawing to finished square. The last step is the rouloetté: the hem is rolled towards the printed face and stitched by hand, which is why a Hermès hem sits slightly proud and why a flat, machine-stitched hem is the quickest thing to check on a scarf offered cheaply.

The sizes are a family rather than a range. The 90 is the classic and the one most designs are made for. The 70 is often silk-cashmere, warmer and softer, and drapes rather than folds. The gavroche at 45 is a pocket square or a neck knot. The Twilly, at five centimetres by eighty-six, was designed to be tied — around a wrist, a ponytail or, most often now, the handle of a bag. Maxi Twillys and the 140 shawls extend the same idea outward.

Designs matter more than most people expect. Some carrés have been reissued in dozens of colourways over decades — Brídes de Gala, Ex-Libris, Jungle Love — while others existed for one season and never returned. Two scarves of identical size and condition can be worth very different amounts on that basis alone, and a design that has never been reprinted in a particular colourway is the thing collectors actually chase.

Condition on silk is read differently to leather. What matters is the hem — whether it is intact, hand-rolled and unfrayed — then pulls in the twill, water marks, and whether the colour has faded on a fold line from being hung in light. A scarf that has been dry-cleaned badly loses the slight body the silk should have. None of this is visible in a folded photograph, which is why we photograph silks opened flat.

Scarves are also the most sensible entry point to the house and the most given as gifts. A carré costs a fraction of any bag, arrives in the orange box, and does not require a relationship with a boutique to obtain. For many of our clients the first Hermès object they owned was a square of silk, and a good number of them still have it.

For anyone buying to wear rather than to collect: the 90 in twill is the versatile one, the 70 in silk-cashmere is the one you will actually reach for in a London winter, and a Twilly is the cheapest way to change how a bag looks. All three are worth handling before choosing, because silk photographs flatter and drape does not.

Every silk at JULL is checked by hand in our London workroom — hem, weave, colour against the design reference, and any marks — and photographed opened out rather than styled. Pieces are new and pre-owned, and we say which. Shown by appointment in London, sent insured across the UK.