Top 10 Interesting Facts about Jane Birkin

Jane Birkin. Photo by Nicolas Genin. Wikimedia

Top 10 Interesting Facts about Jane Birkin

Jane Mallory Birkin is a singer and actress of English and French descent. Jane Birkin rose to international prominence and notoriety. This was as a result of her decade-long musical and romantic collaboration with Serge Gainsbourg. She also had a successful acting career in both British and French films.

Birkin began her career as an actress. She appeared in minor roles in Michelangelo Antonioni’s Blowup and Kaleidoscope. She met Serge Gainsbourg while co-starring in Slogan in 1968. It marked the start of a years-long working and personal relationship. 

Birkin continued to work as an actress and singer after her divorce from Gainsbourg in 1980. Birkin appeared in several independent films and recorded numerous solo albums. In 1991, she starred in the miniseries Red Fox, and in 1998, she starred in the American drama film A Soldier’s Daughter Never Cries.

She starred in the Academy Award-nominated short film La Femme et le TGV in 2016. She stated that was her final film role.

Birkin has spent the majority of her life in France since the 1970s. She is the mother of photographer Kate Barry, who she had with her first husband John Barry. Actress and singer Charlotte Gainsbourg, who she had with Serge Gainsbourg. Musician Lou Doillon, who she had with Jacques Doillon.

Hermès Birkin handbag bears her name, in addition to her acting and musical credits.

1. She was born in the City of London

Jane Mallory Birkin was born in Marylebone, London, on December 14, 1946. Judy Campbell, her mother, was an English actress best known for her stage work. David Birkin, her father, was a Royal Navy lieutenant commander and World War II spy. Andrew Birkin, a screenwriter and director, is her brother. Birkin grew up in Chelsea and described herself as a “shy English girl.” 

She attended Upper Chine School on the Isle of Wight. At the age of 17, she met composer John Barry, whom she married in 1965 and had her first daughter, Kate, with in 1967. After the couple divorced in 1968, Birkin moved back to London to live with her family and began auditioning for film and television roles in both England and Los Angeles, California. 

2. The Vatican and the BBC both banned her song

Jane Birkin. Photo by Nicolas Padovani. Wikimedia

The song in question is “Je T’aime… Moi Non Plus,” which Birkin recorded with her then-boyfriend Serge Gainsbourg in 1968, months after meeting on the set of the film “Slogan.”

When it was released in 1969, the song was banned in several countries and denounced by the Vatican for its suggestive content, featuring heavy panting and breathy sweet nothing’s in French set against cheesy organ music.

Despite being banned by the BBC, it went on to become the first foreign-language single to top the UK charts.

3. In France, she auditioned for a leading female role

Birkin first appeared in the swinging London scene of the 1960s. She had larger roles in the counterculture films Blowup and Kaleidoscope (both 1966), as a fantasy-like model in the psychedelic film Wonder wall (1968), and in the erotic French thriller La Piscine.

She auditioned in France for the lead female role in the film Slogan the same year. Despite the fact that she did not speak French, she was cast as a co-star alongside Serge Gainsbourg, and she performed with him on the film’s theme song, “La Chanson de Slogan,” the first of many collaborations between the two. Birkin moved to France permanently after filming Slogan.

4. Jane Birkin learned French from a tape recorder

Jane Birkin with Heritage Orchestra. Photo by Raph_PH. Wikimedia

She learned French from a tape recorder and from Serge [Gainsbourg], who taught her slang.

5. Jane Birkin met with Hermès’ CEO

Jean-Louis Dumas, the CEO of Hermès, was seated next to Jane Birkin on a flight. Observing her struggling to keep her personal belongings from spilling out of a Hermès Kelly bag-Dumas asked Birkin if he could do anything to help.

6. She designed the Birkin bag

Hermès Ostrich Birkin Bag. Photo by Wen-Cheng Liu. Wikimedia

The Kelly was simply too small, she explained to Hermès’s CEO. Dumas suggested Birkin draw her vision on the back of a sick bag, which she promptly did.

When Dumas returned to Hermès’ Paris atelier, he handed Birkin’s sketch to his artisans and told them to make the actress’s dream accessory a reality. The skilled leather workers created something resembling a classic Hermès Haut à Courroies – a leather and canvas bag first created in the early 1900s to transport saddles and riding boots – but in a smaller size.

7. Jane Birkin owns only a few designer handbags

Unlike the super-rich collectors who have dozens of these pricey accessories, Birkin, now 75, appears to have only owned five or six of them since that fateful meeting with Dumas in 1984.

She only uses one at a time, usually donating an old one – complete with stickers – to charity for auction before replacing it.

8. A documentary has been made about her

Charlotte Birkin, Birkin’s daughter, made her directorial debut in 2021 with Jane by Charlotte, a documentary about her mother. “In France, a lot of the footage from the 1970s, where my parents are together, has been seen by everyone,” Charlotte told The Hollywood Reporter. “Everyone remembers her from those years. I didn’t want to see these lovely but stereotypical images of her. I didn’t care what people knew about her or what they wanted to see. It was done for my own pleasure in a very selfish manner.”

9. She lost her daughter

Kate Barry’s tomb. Photo by ManoSolo13241324. Wikimedia

Kate Barry, the daughter Jane Birkin, died after falling from the fourth-floor window of her Paris apartment. She was born in London.  Birkin released an album inspired by her death called Oh! Pardon Tu Dormais.

10. Jane Birkin has volunteered for Amnesty International

Amnesty International at the Frankfurt Book Fair 2018. Photo by JCS. Wikimedia

Birkin’s humanitarian interests have led her to collaborate with Amnesty International on issues such as immigrant rights and the AIDS epidemic. She has traveled to Bosnia and Herzegovina, Rwanda, Israel, and Palestine. 

Birkin was diagnosed with leukemia in 2002 and underwent rounds of treatment. Birkin suffered a minor stroke in 2021. Her family reported that she is doing well.