“As a decade-long love affair with handbags cools, women have been increasingly scooping up lingerie items, leading some industry watchers to wonder if lingerie is the new handbag.” Only women know for sure.

One week after Oprah Winfey told Entertainment Tonight about a run-in with an allegedly racist sales clerk in Zurich, the sales clerk is fighting back, calling Winfrey a "liar" with "absurd claims."

The design director of Lindsay Lohan's handbag line, 6126, says she is "working with [Lindsay] as usual" even though she's in rehab. We're assuming "usual" means ignoring Lindsay when she calls ranting about adding secret pockets and glittery tassels?

For anyone who's ever considered counterfeit luxury products harmless-after all, what's a fake Vuitton or Chanel bag, or some faux-logo Coach or Fendi?-Scientific American has a study in its new September issue that may make you reconsider.

Central Park: it's sacred space worth billions. But it will be public forever! It will never be sullied by the hand of commerce, or turned into a commercial venue! Except for the huge silver Chanel "Mobile Art pavilion," modeled after a Chanel handbag, that will descend on the park this fall. But it's really an art exhibit, you see, and Chanel is giving a huge donation to be able to put it there, so the commercial angle is totally superfluous. Except that all the freaking art is "inspired by Chanel's classic 2.55 quilted-style chain handbag." You clever bastards. Larger picture of the alien-looking new kind of ad in your life, below:

Heroic woman of dance Madonna has been working for almost a year on a documentary about the obscure African nation of Malawi, her pet cause ever since she adopted a son from the country in 2006. The Material Girl tells Interview magazine (in editor Ingrid Sischy's farewell issue) that, at the time, she "didn't know where Malawi was." That's what makes adoption logistics so difficult [NYP]! To further help the imperiled nation, Madonna teamed up with the good people at Gucci for an ostentatious luxury fundraiser that coincidentally also helped to promote the opening of Gucci's flagship store in NYC. And now it's clear that Gucci's commitment has not flagged—they're selling some items that will be very useful for Malawi-bound "jungle doctors":

We are loving "Deluxe," the book about how the luxury market went mass market by Dana Thomas, Newsweek's culture and fashion writer in Paris. Today's excerpt concerns the counterfeit market, from the suburban housewives who sell the goods to their friends at purse parties to the gangs of New York who actually move the merchandise. Obligatory pimping: "Deluxe," published by The Penguin Press, arrives August 16th.

In "Deluxe," Dana Thomas, Newsweek's culture and fashion writer in Paris, writes about how the luxury market went mass market. In this little excerpt, she looks at the swelling and obsessive handbag market—and takes a trip to an Hermes workshop. (By the way, the book is blurbed by both Fareed Zakaria and Richard Johnson! Crazy.) "Deluxe," published by The Penguin Press, arrives August 16th.