The short answer
Vintage Sac à Dépêches briefcases do get faked, though far less often than Birkins. The copies fall apart on three checks: the heat stamp, the stitching, and the edge paint. Leather and hardware are the easy parts to copy. So if a listing never shows the stamp in focus, treat that as a warning and ask for more photos before you talk price.
What the bag is meant to be
Hermès made the Sac à Dépêches from the late 1940s into the 1990s, in a few sizes, mostly in box calf. Barenia and Courchevel show up on later examples. The shape is a single-flap briefcase with a top handle, two gussets, a lock and a small brass key. It was a working bag, which helps you judge age. Handle patina, rubbed corners and a softened gusset are normal after forty years of office life. A vintage briefcase with stiff, unmarked leather and sharp corners does not fit that story.
How to Fake Hermes Sac a Depeches Vintage
Start with the heat stamp
The stamp sits on the flap or inside the bag and reads HERMÈS PARIS, often with MADE IN FRANCE. A heated die presses the letters into the leather, so the edges are crisp, the depth is even, and the spacing is regular. Fakes go wrong in one of four ways: shallow letters that fade at the edges, letters cut too deep, an E that loses the accent, or wrong letterforms. Hermès also stamped a craftsman code and a date mark, usually a letter inside a shape, sometimes a letter alone. That system ran for decades and collectors still argue about the exact rules. Ignore anyone who offers to look your code up. Hermès does not publish a database, and a site that claims to check one is guessing.
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Stitching is the hardest thing to fake
Hermès sews by hand with two needles and a single thread, one needle entering each side of every hole. The result is a saddle stitch with slight tension differences on the front and back faces, and a small lean to each stitch. Machine stitching is the giveaway on fakes: identical stitches at an identical angle, one continuous thread line, and a locking stitch where the seam starts. Thread on older bags is linen, and it darkens with age instead of staying chalky white. Run your eye along the flap seam. Hand work breathes a little. Machine work repeats.
Fake Hermès Sac à Dépêches Vintage: What to Check Before You Buy
Edge paint and hardware
Hermès slicks and paints the raw edges in thin layers that wear down to the leather. Fakes use a thick, glossy coat that cracks in slabs or peels off in one strip. On hardware, expect gold-plated brass with a warm tone, not a bright orange shine. Wear should reveal base metal with a soft brass color rather than chrome flakes. Engravings on the lock plate, the key and the feet are struck deep and clean. Vintage zippers are often Éclair or Talon, so a modern YKK zip on a 1970s briefcase needs explaining. A repair receipt can cover that, and only that.
Leather, lining and smell
Box calf has a very fine grain, close to poreless, and it takes scratches that you can rub out with a thumb. Vegetable-tanned leather also has a smell, faintly sweet and earthy. Fake leather smells like plastic or solvent. Look at the lining too. Real interiors are leather or chevre; fakes use bonded leather and synthetic suede that pills and sheds. One more thing: a vintage Sac à Dépêches carries almost no external branding. A big H plate or a logo buckle is not a feature of that era, so heavy branding on a vintage briefcase points the wrong way.
When you cannot tell
Price and provenance settle a lot. A sound vintage Sac à Dépêches trades in the low to mid four figures. A mint example for a few hundred dollars is not a bargain. Ask for dated photos of the stamp, the interior, the lock and the zipper pull, and ask what repairs the bag has had. Third-party authentication is worth the fee on a four-figure purchase. A Hermès spa quote shows the house was willing to touch the bag, but it is not a written certificate, so do not treat it as one.