Louis Vuitton introduced the flat-topped trunk in 1858.
The innovation appeared four years after Vuitton opened his own trunk-making shop in Paris. His gray Trianon canvas trunks replaced the rounded lids common on earlier travel trunks. The new shape was lighter, airtight, and easier to stack during journeys by train, carriage, and ship.
Rounded trunks were practical because their curved tops helped water run off, but they wasted vertical space and could not be piled efficiently. Vuitton’s rectangular design answered the needs of increasingly mobile 19th-century travelers, whose luggage had to be transported and stored in crowded railway stations, ship holds, and hotel rooms.
A common mix-up is confusing the 1858 introduction with later Vuitton milestones. The company moved to its Asnières workshop in 1859, changed from the original gray canvas to a striped design in 1876, and introduced the famous Monogram Canvas in 1896. The flat-topped trunk, however, belongs specifically to 1858.