Zoë Kravitz backs raffia bags to soften all-black tailoring

Zoë Kravitz is making a persuasive case for the woven bag as the fastest route out of winter dressing. In London last week, she wore a black jacket over a crisp white button-down and a white tank, then grounded the look with black trousers and loafers before adding a tan woven tote identified as The Row’s Estelle bag in raffia. The effect was immediate: the bag cut through the monochrome and gave the outfit an organic, sun-warmed finish.

A few days earlier in New York City, Kravitz repeated the formula in The Row pieces, this time pairing trousers and suede loafers with another raffia tote. The consistency matters. This is not a one-off celebrity styling trick but a clear preference for texture as the accessory update, especially at a moment when Kravitz’s fashion profile is unusually high. Vogue and the Metropolitan Museum of Art announced on February 23, 2026 that she and Saint Laurent creative director Anthony Vaccarello would co-chair the 2026 Met Gala host committee, with the fundraiser set for Monday, May 4, 2026.

That timing has helped push raffia and straw bags further into the center of the spring/summer 2026 conversation. Fashion coverage has been positioning them as a French-girl staple, the kind of bag that makes black trousers and loafers feel less office-bound and more deliberately relaxed. The styling idea has a name in fashion circles too: the “wrong-bag” move, where a woven, earthy accessory is set against tailored clothes to break the polish just enough. On Kravitz, the contrast feels especially crisp because The Row’s Estelle is a handwoven tote made of 100 percent raffia, a material that reads soft and tactile rather than precious.

Raffia’s appeal also has history on its side. Fashion-history coverage describes the fiber as biodegradable and long tied to summer, travel, sustainability and a rejection of fast fashion. That gives the bag a very specific kind of credibility: it looks current without trying too hard. In Kravitz’s hands, the woven tote is not a beach extra but a finishing move, the detail that turns black tailoring into something lighter, looser and unmistakably summer-ready.