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In the space of a couple of weeks in early December, animal rights activists celebrated three big announcements. The first was when Poland — the world’s second largest producer of animal fur behind China — passed a law that proposes to end fur farming by 2033. Then, the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) announced animal fur will be prohibited at New York Fashion Week (NYFW) from September 2026. And this week, Hearst Magazines, publisher of Elle, Harper’s Bazaar and Esquire among others, announced a ban on fur in its editorial and advertising content (Vogue Business publisher Condé Nast made a similar move in October).
These events cap a decade of successful campaigning to end fashion’s use of animal fur that has seen commercial and legislative bans adopted and the global fur trade reduced to just 15% of its $40 billion peak (which has been declining since 2014).
Campaigners believe we’re at a tipping point. “We’ve seen how these policies lead to a domino effect,” says Emma Håkansson, founding director of Collective Fashion Justice (CFJ), who collaborated with the CFDA and Humane World for Animals on the NYFW ban, as well as the British Fashion Council (BFC) on its London Fashion Week real fur ban in 2023. “I feel confident that we can keep pushing until each of the big four [fashion weeks] have moved beyond fur,” she says. “That will have major implications for the remaining few luxury brands using fur.”
But with the popularity of fur — at least aesthetically — on the rise, and challenges when it comes to finding viable alternatives, the future of animal fur in the fashion industry remains unclear.
Chipping away at fur use
Anti-fur activism first gained momentum in the 1980s, when People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta) protested outside fashions shows, threw fake blood at designers, and enlisted celebrities and supermodels to pose nude in its “I’d rather go naked than wear fur” campaign.
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Calvin Klein was one of the first major global brands to drop fur in 1994, followed by Ralph Lauren in 2006, while Stella McCartney has been proudly animal fur-free since its launch in 2001. Legislation to ban fur farming has been gradually introduced in some countries; the UK became the first to ban fur farming in 2000, followed by Austria in 2005 (though neither were significant producers).
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However, this did little to stem the flow of real fur. In fact, sales of fur increased 70% between 2000 and 2010, according to animal rights-focused research firm Faunalytics, accelerated by China joining the World Trade Organization in 2001 and opening up a new market and production hub to the rest of the world. (According to Statista, today, China remains the biggest producer of fur, with an output of 3.5 million mink and fox pelts in 2023, followed by Poland with three million, and Russia with over 1.5 million. The US and Canada’s output is collectively more than 1.5 million.)
Peta and other animal rights groups upped the ante, running social media campaigns that exposed the brutality of the fur trade; using undercover investigations to capture harrowing supply chain footage and launching email campaigns targeted at the C-suites of brands identified as “villains”. In the meantime, behind-the-scenes negotiations between groups like CFJ and industry bodies grew increasingly effective, with offers to collaborate on the language and policies proving persuasive and creating new momentum.
In 2017, Gucci announced it would ban fur, and over the next few years other luxury fashion houses including Burberry, Prada and Versace followed suit. By 2021, Kering had committed to a ban across its stable of brands encompassing Balenciaga, Saint Laurent and McQueen. Retailers like Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus and Net-a-Porter also went fur free during that period.
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This time, the momentum spread to lawmakers. Between 2015 and 2025, 21 countries in the European Union enacted a full or partial ban on fur production. (Some of this was aided by Covid, when mink — the most popular fur species — were found to be particularly susceptible to the virus.) However, bans on the import and sale of fur have been slower. Israel was the first and only country to completely prohibit the sale of fur in 2021. Import bans are currently being discussed in the UK, while next year, the European Commission will announce a final decision on a ban on fur production and sales in the EU.
In an effort to triage the damage, the International Fur Federation launched Furmark in 2021, a global certification to uphold traceability, environmental and animal welfare standards. But the writing appears to be on the wall: at the fur industry’s 2014 peak, 140 million animals were being killed a year; in 2023, that number had dropped to 20 million. In 2018, there were 4,350 fur farms in the EU; in 2023 that number was just 1,088.
Now, attention is turning to how to stamp it out once and for all.
The problematic rise of faux fur
While the real fur industry is declining, the fur aesthetic dominated the Fall/Winter 2025 runways — an extension of the mob wife and gilded age aesthetics circulating social media (both of which were denoted by the resurgence of fur as a symbol of opulence). According to trend forecasters WGSN, faux fur outerwear surged 30% on the FW25 catwalks, with #FauxFur rising 156%. Google searches for faux fur textures “fluffy” and “shaggy” are up by 78% and 28%, respectively. Meanwhile, the popularity of vintage fur is on the rise, too, according to Trendalytics, between 2023 and 2025 Google searches for “vintage fur coats” increased by 688%.
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Kristen Nuttall, founder of sustainable design consultancy Appso-Supro, says a lot of this demand is being driven by “idealizing wealth”, because fur is seen as an expensive, heritage material. It’s equally hard to separate the destigmatization of wearing fur from the rise of conservative politics, as The New York Times writes: “Perhaps no one loved a fur coat more than Ivana Trump.”
In addition to aesthetics, there is also a performance factor to consider. The biggest fur coat markets in the world are China and Russia — two places where it gets extremely cold. In 2024, they collectively accounted for 50% of all fur coat purchases worldwide. “Real fur is fluffy and warm, and even if it gets cold, because it’s animal hair, it doesn’t get frozen and stuck together,” says Nuttall. “Whereas 99% of faux fur is made from polyester, so if it gets wet, it freezes and doesn’t stop you from getting cold.”
That most faux fur is derived from plastic remains a sticking point for sustainable fashion consultants like Nuttall, who are concerned the alternative to fur is just swapping one set of problems (animal cruelty), for another (reliance on fossil fuels and the disposable fast fashion it creates). “We’re telling people, there’s an alternative, but is the alternative better? It’s great that we’re not killing an animal, but if we’re using more plastic, what is that doing to us?” she says.
While there are innovations across bio-based and recycled faux furs, they are still relatively nascent. Since 2019, Stella McCartney has been exploring bio-based faux fur options, including with startups Ecopel and Biofluff. In 2020, Loro Piana launched Cashfur, a cashmere fabricated to match the texture and appearance of shearling. This season, Chopova Lowena is selling faux fur jackets and bags made from Seaquel, an upcycled plastic yarn. Meanwhile, an increasing number of luxury brands with fur-free pledges — like Bottega Veneta and Givenchy — are turning to shearling.
A big barrier is cost. “Material innovation always comes back to economies of scale and getting people to use it,” says Nuttall. Bio-based options are generally more expensive than many synthetics, though Biofluff co-founder and chief commercial officer Roni Gamzon says its “materials match in price with the premium faux fur that the brands already use”. (She declined to provide exact prices.)
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Next year, denim brand Neuw will release a small run of its first faux fur jacket made from nylon that will retail between $200 and $300. “We are looking for bio-based options, but they’re a bit cost prohibitive for where we sit,” says the brand’s menswear designer Jason Hewitt. “If there’s an uptick and those operations are able to scale to a point where they can do it at an approachable price, then it’s something I would definitely want to do.”
Nuttall adds that there is currently no industry standard for a more sustainable alternative to fur, which is another reason for luxury brands to hesitate. Many fur alternatives positioned as “natural” lean on materials like cashmere and wool, which are increasingly traceable and quantifiable by third-party certifications. These are, however, often doused in chemical treatments to stabilize them when used as faux fur, and the use of animal-derived materials still doesn’t totally satisfy animal rights campaigners. As for synthetic faux furs, impacts are comparatively opaque, with little independent data on chemical use, microfiber shedding and end-of-life.
While innovations are promising, the proof that these materials are commercially viable is scarce. Biofluff has produced a faux fur called Savian, which derives from nettle, hemp and flax. Although the startup has developed prototypes — including a Stella McCartney Savian coat that was presented at COP28 in 2023, and a bag with Ganni — these have yet to hit retail. “This winter brings our first fully commercial brand partnership,” says Biofluff interim CEO Luke Henning (the name of that partner is currently under wraps).
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In 2024, Ecopel unveiled Flur, a 100% plant-based faux fur, at Copenhagen Fashion Week, five years after it launched partially bio-based faux fur Koba at Paris Fashion Week. When asked about the availability of products made with its materials, Arnaud Brunois-Gavard, Ecopel’s sustainability manager, says: “It always takes time for innovation to make its way to the market.”
Recent history shows us how effective the combination of activism, legislation and pledges by industry bodies and designers has been in reducing fashion’s acceptance and use of fur. The European Commission’s announcement next year on whether or not it will prohibit fur farming and sales may be a further blow for fur farmers, and the remaining luxury players still designing with fur. However, as long as it is legal to produce and sell in China and Russia, it’s unlikely to be completely eradicated.
The industry’s desire for a feel-good headline, or the quick win of being associated with an innovative, new material means it is missing opportunities for big-picture systems change like reducing its reliance on virgin polyester, emphasizing material durability and repairability, and centering nature and biodiversity, says Appso-Supro’s Nuttall.
“NYFW banning fur on the runway is super low-hanging fruit,” she says. “It means we’re just inserting a new material like polyester without asking if that material is better or worse. People need to know where things come from and understand the impact of the stuff they’re wearing. Ultimately, if we don’t want to promote the use of animals, we should stop making things that look like animals.”
