London Fashion Week will be fur-free for the first time
For the first time ever, London Fashion Week (LFW) will be fur-free this year. It will no longer show any fur on its catwalks. LFW did not impose a ban on fur, but every designer that will present their collections this year has adopted a fur-free policy, including last-minute holdout Burberry.
After more than a decade of pressure from animal-rights organizations, including Humane Society International UK and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, Burberry announced this month that it would no longer use fur in its collections and appointed Riccardo Tisci as its new creative director to phase out any remaining fur items.
Now, according to a survey by the British Fashion Council, LFW is the first of the major fashion weeks to go completely fur-free, as none of the designers showing has fur in their SS19 collections at London Fashion Week September 2018. The BFC survey results reflect a cultural change based on ideals and choices made by designer businesses, international brands as well as consumer sentiment but also encouraged by the stance of multi-brand stores who are moving away from selling fur.
“I don’t think it is compatible with modern luxury and with the environment in which we live, and Riccardo has a very strong view as well on this” LFW CEO Marco Gobbetti told the media Business of Fashion. “It’s part of what Burberry is today.”
While London is the first major Fashion Week city that has made such an announcement, it indicates a larger trend in the industry as a whole as the world becomes more eco-conscious and educated on sustainability. Michael Kors and Donna Karan in New York and Gucci in Milan have both made recent announcements to the same effect. Other example, the city of San Francisco joined West Hollywood and Berkeley in banning fur sales within city limits.
