Fall Trend Report: Fur and British fashion, a fashionista's manifesto

Todd Lynn Autumn Winte

Anyone who breathed anywhere near a catwalk this round of shows knows that fur is coming back in a BIG way for Autumn Winter 2010. It was everywhere, New York, Paris, and Milan (duh), but, also, surprisingly, in London. London, where I hesitate to step outside the confines of Mayfair and Chelsea in my mink without tattooing the words "THIS IS A VINTAGE COAT" on my forehead, where Russian fox hats provoke hateful looks on the underground and my collection of vintage stoles, when whipped out for a night out on the town, cause passers by on the street to mutter "murderer" as I walk by.

Demonstrators outside Carolina Herrera's show at NYFW

England, the country where, when I was still studying at Oxford, and the university opened a new state of the art animal research center, colleges went on lockdown to protect students from the angry mobs of animal rights demonstrators. Death threats circulated on Facebook and one young scientist was even strangled in her home. I also remember, in Oxford, there's a vintage store, and once, I unearthed a real fur coat on its rails of fakes and asked the shopkeeper if they had any more. Silently, I was ushered downstairs to the basement where an entire racket of black market style selling of vintage fur was taking place. It was like stumbling into a secret brewery in the midst of prohibition...except fashion was the contraband.

Fox at Todd Lynn Autumn Winter 20

In the UK, due to such strong anti-fur sentiments (check out this organization to learn more) and the activism of a slew of groups (probably all spearheaded by Miss all-things-organic Stella McCartney) the breeding of animals solely for their fur was banned in 2003. And the following major luxury retailers have pledged the following: Harvey Nichols - Company Secretary Clive Morton wrote to CAFT: “The Board has today reviewed the Company's fur policy and has decided going forward that we will no longer stock real fur items.” March 2004; Liberty - “Liberty no longer sells fur and has no intention of doing so in the future. Regards Richard Davis, Retail Services Manager”; Selfridges "Selfridges no longer sells any fur, and has a fur free policy."

Getting shaggy at Antonio Berardi Autumn Winter 2010

Wolf-like hood at Amanda Wakeley Autumn Winter 2010

So what, pray tell, will become of these retailer's autumnal outerwear offerings when none of them can stock the key items from the key luxury brands? Ok, so Selfridges and Liberty have foregone the big ticket items from the likes of Gucci and Fendi for years with their businesses no worse for the wear. But now that fur has come home to the isle, unleashed like animals on the runways of the BFC (Todd Lynn, Antonio Berardi, Matthew Williamson, Amanda Wakeley, just off the top of my head), how can they overlook it? Will Harrods, being the only major luxury UK retailer to still stock fur, be the big winner this fall? But then again, Harrods doesn't really embrace its local brethren in the same way as, say, Liberty or Browns, and so will the Berardi foxes and Lynn goatskins go unpurchased? Or does this just mean they'll be selling more abroad? But how much presence do these niche British brands really have abroad? The commercial fall out or readjustment of cultural attitudes over the question of fur remains to be seen.

NB Before rushing to sing the praises of Lagerfeld's all faux-fur collection for Chanel Autumn Winter 2010, hit the pause button and consider the fact that Monsieur Lagerfeld is ALSO at the helm of Fendi, Italy's premier furrier, whose collection for fall was overflowing with dead animals.

feathered fox at Matthew Williamson Autumn Winter 2010

As for me personally, my stance on this controversial topic--I won't win any brownie points for this, but, like Anna herself, I do wear the stuff. Of course it pains me to think about the cruelty involved. HOWEVER, having grown up in a culture (i.e. America) that reveres fine fur as much as it condemns it (what is: Dennis Basso, Carolina Herrera and Oscar de la Renta?), not to mention in a frigid climate where one is forced to make the realization that our cave dwelling ancestors were right in the fact that there simply isn't anything warmer than a cozy bit of rabbit or fox (I would not have lasted one Massachusetts winter at uni without my rabbit lined Juicy Couture hoody layered over thick wool sweaters and under Arctic-ready coats).

I love beautiful things, plain and simple. And one of those beautiful things growing up was Mamma Whisperer dressed to the nines for a chic night out in NYC in the early nineties in her gorgeous full length Galliano mink: the very paradigm of elegance. But what does pain me (here comes a bit of a elitism, but then again, supporting the argument of egalitarian fur for all would probably put you at the top of PETA's hit list) is the cheap fur. The white rabbits robbed of their skins to make hideous pom pom scarves sold at Portobello Market for a fiver. Cheesetastic hideous jackets for sale in towns China and Camden. Cheap fur for fur's sake. Since the prices are so low, god only knows where the products came from, the horror that those animals (predominantly rabbits) endured to make that disgusting jacket hanging in the window on the X High Street for £19.99. This is what, with Butters tugging along behind me, breaks my heart.

From Antonio Berardi Autumn Winter 2010

In my opinion, fur should be a luxury commodity ONLY. And a fiercely regulated one at that. That is to say, the customer who is going to shell out 10K for a Fendi mink probably wouldn't care if the price was ratcheted up to 12, especially if that 2 grand made the difference between the unspeakable things we all know go on at fur farms and a humane way of going about it. Strict regulations about the humane treatment of animals destined (or doomed) for fur purposes, methods that are humane that will cost more, thus eradicating (in an ideal world) the mid and low-end market for fur. Or perhaps a simple return to really committing to using the whole animal, a return to the way they did things back when the Queen was in need of new hunting gear or a prince a new rug. I'm pretty sure that back in the day, when food was scarce and the half-starved peasant population enormous, someone probably always ate the leftovers.

Ermine cape on display at Museum of London

To abolish fur entirely is to disregard our sartorial history, traditions of fine furriers dating back as far as ancient times (Caesar loved himself a bit of wolf trim, hellllo it was cold in the Alps!). Courtly traditions of furs such as ermine--there does (or did) exist a legitimate trade, a craft passed down from generation to generation resulting in the production of garments so beautiful we still display and cherish them in museums. And this is part of our human history as artisans and craftsmen. Fendi, for example, continues to produce fur garments of tremendous beauty and luxury today. What I'm trying to say is that fur has been the prerogative of the wealthy, the powerful, the royal and the luxurious for centuries, millenia even. Fur shouldn't be available en masse, I'd rather not be able to afford a stitch of it, content to marvel from a distance, if it meant that gorgeous and glamorous fur could still exist without so much of the moral depravity.

Essentially, I want to have my cake and eat it too. Or, I suppose, in the manner of "by-products," eat my rabbit and wear it too and I don't see why we can't, in this modern and "enlightened" day and age, where technology abounds and miracles of science can and do come true, come up with a reasonable solution to this age old controversy.