MERIT Beauty’s signature makeup bag is getting a refresh. (Gasp—we know. This is big.) The brown corduroy pouch is practically embedded in the brand’s DNA, having been offered as a gift with your first purchase on its site and featured in countless It Girl Instagram flatlays since the brand launched five years ago.
With more than 700,000 bags distributed, the bag has landed in the same league as some of the brand’s most beloved products, including Flush Balm ($30) and The Minimalist ($38)—so much so that it has even appeared on resale sites as an accessory in its own right.
MERIT Beauty’s new-for-2026 navy makeup bag
MERIT Beauty’s original brown corduroy makeup bag
It’s earned fashion-world cred too; MERIT has partnered with luxury fashion labels Proenza Schouler, TOVE and Brandon Maxwell on limited-edition iterations, but now the original is entering a new era, retaining its defining elements while introducing a more refined structure in the brand's signature slate blue.
The Merit x Brandon Maxwell Signature Bag
The Merit x Proenza Schouler Signature Bag
“The Signature Bag was never intended to be just a makeup bag,” said the brand in a statement. “When we first started working on it in 2020, the idea was always to create an accessory—something you’d actually want to take with you and use in your everyday life.”
“But we’ll be the first to admit—after five years, it was ready for a refresh,” it continues. “So we went back and read through every comment and DM our community sent us over the years. The demands for zippers. The requests for pockets and longer straps. That one person who’s still asking for the return of the limited-edition black velvet version from December 2021.”
“And after all that—we did none of it,” the statement teases. “Instead, we kept the same design elements that made it a signature to begin with, and just reimagined it in slate blue. Because if there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it’s that some things you just get right the first time.”
All first-time orders that ship starting today, September 10, will receive the new navy blue Signature Bag, officially retiring the beloved brown corduroy—now, officially, a collector’s item.
