Recent subzero temperatures have brought a flood of fur onto the
streets. Are
attitudes changing toward the trade?
by Justine Picardie,
Telegraph.co.uk
As temperatures dropped last month and the snow kept falling, I started
noticing fur coats in my neighbourhood, the politically correct north
London suburb of Crouch End. This is a place with an independently owned
organic shop that still flourishes next to Waitrose, where campaigners
wave petitions for Greenpeace and against factory farming, and a large
population of foxes are sufficiently confident of their welcome to
saunter across my road in daylight.
The furs that have suddenly sprouted around here are not the kind that
you would see in Mayfair or Knightsbridge – the smooth minks of a
Russian oligarch’s wife or mistress, say – but vintage (in other words,
decidedly second hand). I’ve spotted them on young mothers wearing Ugg
boots, pushing buggies through the slushy streets, and on teenage girls
in skinny jeans and red wellies; a constituency that up until this
winter would have stuck to their usual uniform of Gap denim jackets or
Uniqlo pea coats.
Clearly, it’s not just a localised trend, because you’ll observe a
similar look elsewhere, while the street markets of Camden, Brick Lane
and Portobello are doing a roaring trade in old furs for young women.
This time last year, you’d barely have seen an animal pelt worn in
public, unless it was by foreigners who think the British are
sentimental.
Indeed, fur was one of the defining differences between London Fashion
Week and Paris, New York and Milan: the British didn’t wear it, but
everyone else from a cold climate did. Now, according to the British Fur
Trade Association, “there has been a significant growth in fur sales”
in the UK, which is part of a global increase (worldwide sales totalled
$13 billion in 2008, an increase of nearly 60 per cent compared to the
end of the 1990s).
As you might expect, the British Fur Trade Association is also touting
its wares as a “responsible choice”: “Real fur remains a supreme example
of a fashion product that derives from a wholly natural, sustainable
resource, is long-lasting but ultimately biodegradable. Many ‘fake’ furs
are manufactured with non-renewable petroleum based products… Real fur
is a durable material – quite the opposite of disposable fashion.”
The opponents of fur remain equally vocal. PETA (People for the Ethical
Treatment of Animals) is campaigning against Burberry for its use of
fur, accusing the fashion house of being “synonymous with cruelty to
animals”. And the naming and shaming of fur-wearing celebrities
continues: PETA’s list of ‘‘worst-dressed celebrities’’ for 2009 has
Madonna at the top, and also lambasts the Olsen twins (“Since fur adds
20 years and 20 pounds, maybe Mary-Kate and Ashley think their matronly
wardrobe will deflect the gossip about bulimia”); Maggie Gyllenhaal
(“Maggie has gone from being lost in her brother’s shadow to being lost
inside some really ugly fur coats”); and Elizabeth Hurley (“instead of
flaunting the remains of animals, this faded siren might focus on the
remains of her career”).
Meanwhile, even though fur is creeping into the High Street (in
rabbit-trimmings), as well as luxury fashion houses (including Marni, a
label much-admired for its boho-chic credentials), there remains a
wariness among magazine editors to be seen to support the fur trade.
Sam Baker, editor of Red magazine, says: “We don’t shoot fur on Red. As
far as I’m concerned it’s cruel and completely unnecessary. I’m not a
fan of vintage fur either – the animal still suffered. But also, I think
the wearing of any fur at all, vintage or otherwise, anaesthetises the
wearer. You’re only one gold card away from a new fur coat if you’ve
bought an old one.”
Alexandra Shulman, the editor of Vogue, is less militant, but tends to
avoid the use of fur in the magazine: “We have a no-fur policy, but the
odd cuff and collar creep in. The last research I did a couple of years
ago showed that people in this country are still broadly against the use
of fur in fashion.”
Whatever one’s view on the rights and wrongs of wearing fur, there seems
to have been an unspoken message in the last six or eight weeks that
second-hand fur is becoming acceptable in cold weather. For this you can
probably blame Kate Moss, who has been out and about in vintage fur,
wearing it with the rock and roll insouciance for which she is famous.
In doing so, she looks entirely different to a wealthy Milanese matron
in a new mink; more like Venus in furs, quite possibly with very little
on underneath.
At this point, I should make a confession, which is that at the end of
November, with the prospect of a subzero sojourn in the Scottish
Highlands, I went to my favourite second-hand shop and asked if they had
a “warm coat”. The word fur did not cross my lips – I am of the
generation that grew up mourning the baby seals clubbed to death in
snowy wastes on the other side of the world. During my time working for
Vogue, fur did not appear on the fashion pages.
Nevertheless, when the owner of the shop appeared with a furry coat, I
did not say: “Is this fake?” I did note that it was modestly priced
(less than Topshop), handmade of an indeterminate material, unlabelled,
and at least 50 years old. Since then, I have worn it on a daily basis,
and slept under it, as well, on the coldest nights when the temperature
in Scotland dropped to minus 18.
I suppose I’ve taken the coward’s way out by not knowing its origin; nor
do I want to run the gauntlet of animal rights activists, especially
after discovering that a fashion editor friend of mine was targeted when
she spoke out in favour of fur. “I got some very threatening letters,”
she says, “including ones that said, ‘We know where you live, and where
your children go to school.’”
Another friend in the fashion business wears her Italian grandmother’s
old fur coat, but avoids confrontation on the subject, despite feeling
irritated by the inconsistencies awash in her own industry. “I can’t
understand people who’ll buy clothes from Topshop, which still hasn’t
signed up to the Ethical Trading Initiative, or eat supermarket battery
chickens, and then give me a hard time for wearing fur.”
She’s right, of course, but when did fashion ever flourish under the
aegis of logic or consistency? Come the spring, fake leopard-spot prints
will be back…