The Row Margaux: Soft Margaux vs the Original, Spec by Spec

Ask five people to describe the difference between the Margaux and the Soft Margaux and you will get five confident, contradictory answers. It is understandable confusion, given that the two share a name, a silhouette and a set of signature buckles, and that the shopping situation around them changed sharply in 2025. What follows is specification-led rather than impression-led — measurements, materials, closures, linings and observed prices, placed against each other line by line. All of it comes from what the brand states on its own product pages and from prices observed in the market in 2026 — observations, not an official price list. Any figure that is not reliably documented is flagged as such rather than assumed, as the Margaux is the single most misquoted bag in the label’s catalogue. The short version: the Soft is neither a cheaper nor a lazier Margaux, it is the better equipped one. The long version follows.

Two Bags, One Name, One Complicated Year

The original Margaux is the flagship the brand built its handbag reputation on, an unlined-looking tote whose structure derives from leather thickness and panel shaping rather than from stiffeners. The Soft Margaux came in as a related but separately specified bag, carrying its own construction details and its own product pages. Over the course of 2025 the original was pulled from third-party retailers, and the brand’s own webstore now shows the Soft Margaux and the Margaux Shoulder rather than the original. Its discontinuation has been widely reported, but it has never been officially confirmed by the brand, and that distinction is not pedantry when you are deciding what to pay on the secondary market. In practice this means the Soft Margaux is the version available new, while the original has become a resale proposition. Anyone comparing the two is really comparing a current product with an archive one, and that changes how the specification differences should be weighted.

Two Spec Sheets, Compared

The clearest way to see the difference is to isolate the features the Soft version adds and take them one at a time. There are five in total, and together they change how the bag behaves in daily use rather than how the row handbags leather tote bags it looks from across a street. Protective metal feet hold the base off the ground. An interior toggle closure gives the open-top shape a way to shut. Belted side gussets let the profile be cinched or released. A zip pocket and card slots turn a deep cavity into something organised. The table sets these out with the observed 2026 figures for the versions sold new.

Materials and Linings

Stated as 100 percent calfskin in a matte grained finish, the Soft Margaux 10 and 12 are both lined in cotton herringbone. The lining choice reveals plenty about the brand’s priorities: a cotton herringbone interior is a textile decision, not a branding one, and it holds shape without introducing the plastic feel of a coated logo jacquard. The Margaux Shoulder 12 goes further still with a 100 percent lambskin lining, which is softer, marks more readily and costs considerably more to work with. Across the wider family the exterior materials include grained calfskin, saddle calfskin, suede, canvas paired with leather, and nylon, so a Margaux is not automatically a smooth-leather bag. Made in Italy is stated on the brand’s own product pages for the Soft Margaux 10 and 12, and for the Margaux Shoulder 12 as well. Suede and canvas versions read differently in the hand and, importantly, behave differently on resale.

Hardware, Buckles and Handles

Hardware on the Soft Margaux is palladium-plated and finished matte rather than polished, consistent with the rest of the collection. The signature element on any Margaux is its pair of adjustable side buckles, and on genuine examples the buckles are engraved, as are the base feet where feet are fitted. Those buckles do real work rather than decoration: they are what lets the belted gussets change the width of the bag. A 5-inch handle drop is common to the Soft Margaux 10 and 12, which puts it in hand-carry or crook-of-the-elbow territory rather than shoulder territory, and both include a removable shoulder strap to cover the difference. The Margaux Shoulder 12 replaces that arrangement entirely with elongated tubular handles and narrowed gusseted side panels, so it is designed from the start to sit under the arm. If you want a single The Row bag that works hands-free without a strap, the Shoulder is the one rather than the Soft.

Reading the Sizes and the Numbers

The number in the name is just the width of the bag in inches, which makes this family easier to navigate than most. The Soft Margaux 10 arrives at 10 x 7 x 7.5 inches, genuinely compact with an unusual amount of depth for the footprint. At 12 x 9 x 7.5 inches, the Soft Margaux 12 keeps the depth and adds two inches of width and two of height, which is why most buyers settle on it for daily use. The Margaux Shoulder 12 comes in at 14.75 x 9 x 5 inches, which makes it the widest and shallowest of the three despite the 12 in its name, as the number refers to the bag’s stated size rather than its maximum external span. A Soft Margaux 15 exists as well, and a leather-and-canvas Margaux 17 has been carried by Selfridges. Neither of them has a verifiable retail price, so any figure quoted for them should be treated as an asking price rather than a documented one.

What Each Costs, and What Resale Is Doing

Observed 2026 market pricing puts the Soft Margaux 10 at $3,650, the Soft Margaux 12 at $4,350 and the Margaux Shoulder 12 at $4,900. That places the entire family in the collection’s top band, alongside the India and Agnes top handles and the Marlo totes. The secondary market picture is an unusual one: the Rebag CLAIR 2025 report recorded the Margaux Tote at 107 percent value retention, inside a brand-level figure of 97 percent that lifted the label into the report’s unicorn tier for the first time. The softer secondary numbers say the same thing — frequent Margaux sales reported at around 40 percent above retail, Fashionphile resale reported up roughly 44 percent year on year, and The RealReal reporting pre-owned Margaux sales averaging about 15 percent over original retail. One major resale authenticator places new Margaux bags in the $5,000 to $9,000 range, and that is a useful sanity check, because anything advertised in the hundreds is almost certainly counterfeit. None of it amounts to investment advice, and canvas, nylon and seasonal-colour versions are worth remembering as the ones that discount rather than appreciate.

Which Version to Choose

The straightforward answer for anyone who wants the bag they can actually purchase new, with a warranty of availability and the fuller specification, is the Soft Margaux. Choose the 10 if you carry little and want the shape at its most sculptural, and the 12 if you want a working bag, since the second card slot and the zip pocket only appear at that size. The Margaux Shoulder 12 is the pick if your carry is under the arm rather than in the hand, because tubular handles and narrowed gussets are built for exactly that. Pursue the original on resale only if you specifically want the archive version and you are comfortable buying without metal feet, a toggle closure or interior organisation. Whatever you pick, note that the brand runs no public authenticity coding system at all, so verification comes down to stitching, hand-painted edges, stamp placement and the weight and finish of the hardware. Buy black or neutral calfskin if resale matters to you, and buy whatever colour you like if it does not.

1. Resolve hand-carry or shoulder first, since that splits Soft from Shoulder immediately
2. Then size: the 10 for occasion carry, the 12 for daily use
3. Then material, keeping in mind that canvas and seasonal colours discount on resale
4. And only then consider an original on the secondary market