Fur is officially back in fashion.
When animal pelts and faux fur appeared across the Autumn/Winter 2024 runways, sustainability advocates hoped it was a passing trend linked to the rise of the ‘mob wife’ aesthetic (remember that?). AW25 has proven otherwise.
It started at the Prada menswear show in January, where roughly cut shearling vests that emulated fox fur pelts were layered over knitwear and slung around shoulders. As the season rolled on, a flurry of designers embraced the aesthetic — especially in womenswear. Rabanne sent fur slit skirts down the runway; exposed shearling-as-fur backs tore out of tailored dresses at Bally; and shearling or faux fur micro-minis cropped up at Marni, Simone Rocha and Blumarine, to name a few.
“Even though everyone is broke, people still want pieces that signal wealth and luxury — and fur is one of them,” observed trend forecaster Mandy Lee (known online as Old Loser in Brooklyn) in an Instagram post. The rise of conservatism has also spurred demand for animal products over vegan alternatives, across fashion, food and beauty. “Fur once symbolised something evil and unethical, and was totally shunned by the industry at large. The reintroduction of fur en masse is another sign that conservatism has a grasp on the fashion industry — intentional or not,” added Lee.
Earlier this week, Gabriela Hearst made a statement by including upcycled vintage mink fur coats in her Paris show. Her use of fur was selective and intentional: she created a one-of-a-kind coat, jacket and stole by unstitching vintage mink fur coats bought in Italy and reassembling them as hand-knit intarsia using a vertical herringbone stitch. Hearst said in her show notes that she used fur to convey something primal. “This collection feels sophisticated and raw,” she wrote. “And nothing is more sophisticated and raw than nature itself.”
The resurgence of fur has been as quick and comprehensive as its exile, which began in earnest at the end of 2018. After decades of campaigning from animal rights activists, brands and retailers finally relented, citing changing consumer demands. Chanel, Burberry, Macy’s and Yoox Net-a-Porter were among the first to ban or start phasing out fur. A second wave came when Kering banned fur in 2021, soon followed by Dolce Gabbana, Moncler and Neiman Marcus. The British Fashion Council and Copenhagen Fashion Week have both banned animal fur, but Paris, New York and Milan fashion weeks still allow its use on the runway.
The animal fur industry has retaliated to industry bans by attempting to reposition it as a sustainable and natural option compared to — largely synthetic — faux furs, tapping into that conservative mood. And this debate has continued to rage, even as fur floods the runways.
Exploring animal-based alternatives
For activist and filmmaker Emma Håkansson, whose non-profit Collective Fashion Justice advocates for animal and human rights in fashion supply chains, there is a clear distinction between real and faux fur, even if they look the same. “There’s nothing wrong with using cheetah print, but there is something wrong with using cheetah skin,” she says. “If we stop using real animal fur, that’s a good thing because we are moving beyond violence against animals and the environmental consequences of that.”
But while the leather alternative space has seen significant interest and investment — with brand support spanning from Hermès to Ganni — fur alternatives have largely flown under the radar.
Italian manufacturing conglomerate Gruppo Florence is one of the innovators supplying luxury brands with animal-based fur alternatives. Since 2022, its Natural Ethical Fur (NEF) has been available to luxury clients. The product was developed in response to the growing demand for high-quality, plastic-free faux fur, leveraging the leather and fur expertise at its Tuscan subsidiary Ciemmeci Fashion. NEF used a weaving process similar to knitting to turn noble fibres such as wool, alpaca, camel, mohair and cashmere into fur-like fabrics. The final product is fully customisable, with the potential to alter the hair length (short or long), the appearance (matte or glossy) and the finish (smooth or curly). “This way, you avoid killing the animals, because you just have to cut their hair, and you don’t have to use petroleum,” explains CEO Attila Kiss.
However, the production processes are more expensive than those required for real fur, Kiss says, which offsets any savings from the extraction process. This can pose a barrier to uptake for brands, so NEF remains a niche, luxury product.
Proponents of animal-based alternatives point to the need to avoid petroleum-derived synthetics, but many natural materials go through significant chemical treatments to stabilise them before they are turned into fashion products, and few biodegrade in the way their ‘natural’ moniker may imply.
After years on the decline amid bans and protests, fur is everywhere this season. Whether it’s real or faux, it’s raising concerns about fashion’s sustainability commitments.
Still, there is an argument for investing in animal-based alternatives that leverage regenerative agriculture practices to boost the climate and social impacts of certain animal products, such as wool. “If we produce wool responsibly, it can actually be a climate solution and help to support farming communities in locations where there aren’t many other opportunities for employment,” says Nina Marenzi, founder and director of The Sustainable Angle, which hosts the annual Future Fabrics Expo.
Finding a better solution
Håkansson worries that brands swapping fur for other animal products are missing an opportunity to rethink fashion’s value system. There are plenty of examples of this already, she says. London-based designer Roksanda Ilinčić has used raffia grass to achieve a similar amount of movement and volume to fur while avoiding faux iterations, and Ukrainian designer Ksenia Schnaider has opted for frayed upcycled denim to similar ends. “Ideally, we would take the sentiment [behind banning fur] and use our creativity to move somewhere genuinely responsible that has no animal exploitation at all,” says Håkansson.
The innovations brands are most excited by are the ones which are both plastic-free and plant-based. Some have already made their way onto runways, co-signed by brands that are known for their sustainability practices. In Paris, Copenhagen export Ganni used a recycled polyester alternative from global faux fur textile manufacturer Ecopel, while Stella McCartney opted for Savian, a vegan and plastic-free alternative made from nettle, hemp and flax by French American biomaterials startup Biofluff.
Most fur alternatives are either plant-based or plastic-free, notes Biofluff co-founder and chief commercial officer Roni Gamzon. It’s difficult to have both and maintain the performance and quality expectations of luxury fashion, especially without the vocal and financial support of brands. Biofluff says it has found a workaround by using lower impact plant-based materials like nettle, hemp and flax, which are widely available across Europe.
Others offer stop-gap solutions while they develop something better. Faux fur atelier Ecopel’s first attempt at a bio-based fur was Koba, which launched in 2019, made from 37 per cent corn-based ingredients and 63 per cent recycled polyester. Another iteration, dubbed Gacha, was a modified polyester, designed to be commercially compostable in 180 days, but was discontinued due to lack of demand. “Brands preferred our recycled options because they were more advanced and had a better hand feel,” says Ecopel communication and sustainability manager Arnaud Brunois. “Sometimes, innovations are too technical for designers to understand.”
In the coming months, Ecopel will launch its first 100 per cent bio-based fur, which would theoretically solve the plastic problem and avoid animal products, but they are tight-lipped about the specifics. “We stopped using virgin petroleum fibres already,” says Brunois. “Ultimately, we want to be using only vegetable or bio-based fibres.”
Mastering the fabrication is only the first step to displacing animal-based alternatives to fur and synthetic faux furs. Innovators must also secure industry buy-in, so moments like the current fur trend can help them scale. But the iteration process to take brand partnerships from pilot to production is long-winded.
Even if brands are willing to invest in developing prototypes, explains Biofluff’s Gamzon, most ask innovators to sign NDAs, so their competitors don’t swipe their suppliers, which in turn limits innovators’ abilities to prove market demand to investors. And whether or not they can secure high-profile moments like being included on the runways of big brand collaborators often comes down to the whims of stylists rather than the sustainability teams they have been collaborating with. Biofluff, for example, has been flirting with a fashion week debut for several seasons, hoping to gain a spot through one of the brands it works with, but only made the final cut in AW25.
“We work with a lot of brands behind the scenes to develop our materials, test their durability and performance, and improve the aesthetics, but it’s a long process,” says Gamzon “If brands all said they were interested and came together to support innovation, it would be a game changer.”
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