First glass, now this: Coperni launches bag made of 99 per cent air

Laura Scholz

7.3.2024

Translation: machine translated

The French brand Coperni is definitely not lacking in creativity and innovation. As part of Paris Fashion Week, they relaunched their iconic "Swipe Bag". Made from a material previously employed by NASA.

If the keyword Coperni doesn't immediately ring a bell, I'll be happy to help you out. Founded in Paris in 2013 by Sébastien Meyer and Arnaud Vaillant, Coperni always manages to stand out from the crowd of countless fashion houses. Because they don't just do tailoring in their atelier. The duo has already sent bags made of glass and with a Sony CD player look down the catwalk and had model Bella Hadid spray-paint a dress on her naked body live in front of the audience.

New season, new viral moment

During their current show for autumn/winter 24, the next sensation was revealed. A new edition of the obviously extremely versatile "Swipe Bag". The 2024 version also contains glass again, but only one per cent. The remaining 99 per cent of the bag is made of ... air. No joke.

For the "Air Swipe Bag", Coperni hired visual artist and art and nanotechnology expert Ioannis Michalous. And he didn't just use any old material for his creation, but the nanomaterial silica aerogel - the lightest solid in the world. The bag made of "frozen smoke", as the material is also known because of its appearance, weighs a mere 33 grams.

What are aerogels?

In an essay for the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, Emma von Helden describes the manufacturing process as follows: "Aerogels are produced by drying a gel, usually silica, under extreme conditions."
The resulting structure is probably best visualised as a sponge. This is because aerogels basically consist of pores - 99.98 per cent to be precise. And thus earn the title of highly porous. Sounds pretty unstable and fragile at first. But the opposite is the case: the inner surfaces of the pores are in the nanometre range and the contact points of the branches are so stable that the material can boast extremely low energy transmission, highly efficient sound absorption, thermal insulation and fire resistance up to 1200 degrees Celsius. It can also withstand 4000 times the pressure of its own weight. No wonder that aerogel has been immortalised 14 times in the Guinness Book of Records and is used as insulation in the construction of houses and industrial buildings, for underwater systems, oil refineries and refrigerators. Aerogel particles are even used in the cosmetics industry.

What sounds almost extraterrestrial is of course also of great interest to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, aka NASA. Keeping rocket fuel at cryogenic, i.e. ultra-low temperatures? A potential building material for a greenhouse on Mars? Aerogel, aerogel. Collecting (and transporting to Earth) stardust, which was first successfully achieved in 1999 thanks to containers made of aerogel, sounds particularly romantic.

Cosmic accessory, cosmic price?

Unfortunately, Sébastien Meyer and Arnaud Vaillant have not yet revealed whether, when and at what price the "Air Swipe Bag" will be available to buy. However, I'm willing to bet that 33 grams of air will rarely have been so expensive. <p

Laura Scholz

Senior Editor

Laura.Scholz@digitecgalaxus.ch

Always in the mood for good hits, great trips and clinking drinks.

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