Miss Fish box clutch from Sylvia Toledano

Being a Piscean I am drawn to all things fish. I love swimming with them too. So how could I resist this simply amazing hand- embellished 'Miss Fish' box clutch by Sylvia Toledano which I came across when browsing the Net-a-Porter website?

You can add a chain shoulder strap and the crystals are all Swarovski - and there are hundreds of them. Hence the price, a cool £1050. Oh well....

Gorgeous Balenciaga Bag from Matches

Balenciaga bag, £495

I must be in a dream state as it's New Year but I have been ever so slightly hypnotised by this Balenciaga bag on the Matches.com website. It's a little messenger bag which will be filthy in no time if I ever get my hands on one - but a girl can dream can't she? Balenciaga messenger bag, £495, Matchesfashion.com

Buy a Lulu Guinness original for £15

British bag designer Lulu Guinness has put her talent to a really good cause just in time for Christmas with this exclusive tote bag which is on sale to raise charity funds for The Royal Marsden, Chelsea. Just £15 the entire profit will go to the hospital, which was the first in the world that was dedicated to the treatment of cancer.

It is available from The Royal Marsden and you will be helping some 40,000 patients who attend the hospital each year. The bag is 100% polyester.

Top five handbags for Summer 2011

I am happy that the designer handbag with designer price tag is less of an obsession these days. In fact I haven't seen the likes of Coleen Rooney or Victoria Beckham gracing the pages of a weekly fashion mag clutching (or being dragged down by - let's face it) an over-sized bag whose price-tag would pay about six months of my mortgage, for quite a while now.

Victoria Beckham and Hermes bag  Photo posh24.com

When we are in full recession mode and job safety is a worry for most in the country, a new and expensive handbag is a bit embarrassing really and I, for one, would feel a bit silly lusting after a handbag in the way that I would have done only a couple of years back. Women and handbags (and shoes) have a strange relationship. I was fascinated by a programme the other week which highlighted the almost primeval draw that we have towards expensive accessories. They wired a woman up to a machine to study her brainwaves as she was shown images of bags, some expensive and some cheap. Her brain activity went wild when she was presented with an expensive designer leather bag, and was dormant when shown the cheap high-street alternative. So does this say we are all doomed to desiring those things we cannot afford even when all around us is unstable and bleak? Are we to resort to aversion therapy with electric shocks to accompany the photographs of the well-made and desirable? I hope not. I hope to see our salvation in the high-street so to kick-start another week of doom and gloom headlines and sudden summer downpours, I give you five of my favourite and most affordable handbags that are roomy enough to carry all my summer clobber (like an umbrella and extra pair of thermals) yet make a bit of a statement for under £100... So you see, recession or no recession I still can't resist a new bag....

Faux crocodile tote bag by Betty Jackson for  Designers at Debenhams, £96

Principles by Ben de Lisi navy, beige and cream  bag  £28 from Designers at Debenhams

Messenger bags are big this summer, this beige  version is just £24.99 from River Island

A soft red leather satchel with tan trim comes in at an affordable £95 from Top Shop

Gloriously shiny and bang on the money in terms of  colour and shape, this  Per Una  shopper is a perfect buy for £28.