Dolce & Gabbana Banning Fur Is Important In The Italian Fashion Industry

Animal fur, especially angora rabbit fur, has been banned from Dolce & Gabbana’s future collections. Despite the fact that the brand has yet to make a public statement, it has confirmed its intentions to the non-profit group In Defense of Animals (IDA).

The decision by the business to stop using fur is part of a bigger trend in the luxury fashion sector to avoid using the cruel and needless animal material. Each year, the fashion industry as a whole kills around 100 million animals for fur, including two million dogs and cats. Mink, foxes, raccoons, and rabbits, among other species, are held to filthy, tight cages on fur farms for their whole lives and then bludgeoned, gassed, electrocuted, or skinned alive to extract the fur. As a result, a number of groups throughout the world, including IDA, have urged firms like Dolce & Gabbana to stop using the inhumanely produced material.

“Fur and angora cause extreme cruelty to animals, and we appreciate Dolce & Gabbana’s efforts to set the trend for compassion… Clothing and accessories needn’t harm animals. We urge all designers to follow suit by ditching all fabrics made from animal fur and skin,” stated Fleur Dawes, IDA Communications Director.

Fur Banned Across The Board

Italy has always been a fashion hotspot, and the country is helping to pave the way for a fur-free future. Last year, the country’s Senate passed an amendment that would close the country’s remaining ten mink fur farms by June and outright outlawed fur farming statewide. This week, Moncler, an Italian company, joined Dolce & Gabbana in announcing a similar fur ban. “We’re thrilled Moncler is committed to making the fashion industry more humane… Italy has quickly become a hub for fur-free fashion now that the country banned fur farming last year and many of its renowned brands—including Armani, Prada, Versace, Valentino and Gucci–are fur-free,” stated PJ Smith, Fashion Policy Director for the Humane Society of the United States and Humane Society International.

There are many more fashion firms and stores that have pledged to stop using and selling fur. More than 1,500 businesses across the world have committed to adopting fur-free practices in recent years. Fur has been removed from the shelves of major shops such as Bloomingdale’s, Macy’s, Nordstrom, Meiman Marcus, Bergdorf Goodman, Saks Fifth Avenue, and H&M. Fashion houses such as Canada Goose, Saint Laurent, Alexander McQueen, and Balenciaga have also ditched the animal-cruelty-inducing materials from their designs.

ELLE, a media conglomerate, followed suit in December 2021, banning fur from 45 editions and 46 websites. The move by the media behemoth to formally halt its promotion of fur bans the animal product from all editorial pieces, press photographs, runway and street style images, as well as advertisements—a significant statement that reaches 175 million readers across the world.

A number of celebrities have spoken out against the usage of fur. Billie Eilish, a vegan artist, consented to wear an Oscar de la Renta gown to last year’s Met Gala on the condition that the designer modify his policy and stop selling fur. Alex Bolen, the company’s CEO, agreed, marking a momentous shift for the designer.

“If you buy fur then you buy cruelty,” British comedian Ricky Gervais declared as part of a Fur Free Friday campaign in 2020. Gervais, who recently disclosed he is vegan, has also spoken out against purchasing fur. “Beautiful, innocent, intelligent animals, tortured to death for fashion. Shame on you. Disgusting. I stand with In Defense of Animals against the cruel fur trade.”

A Fur-Free Future

Aside from the brutal reality of fur, one event that is further driving fur out of vogue occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic, when numerous mink farms across Europe and the United States confirmed the presence of the COVID-19 virus in mink. As a result, numerous countries began widespread culling of mink, with some countries closing down mink farms as a public health measure.

As the fur-free movement grows in strength, it is expanding beyond individual firms abandoning the brutally born material to towns and nations imposing formal fur bans. Israel was the first country to prohibit the selling of brutally born animal skins last year.

In the United States, fur prohibitions have recently been established in San Francisco, West Hollywood, and Los Angeles. California became the first state in the US to prohibit fur sales and trapping in 2019.

Source: “WHY DOLCE & GABBANA BANNING FUR IS A BIG DEAL TO ITALY’S LUXURY FASHION INDUSTRY” by VegNews