Like Burberry, Prada, Versace, Valentino bans fur, will focus only on main brand
The latest Valentino collection to include fur will be the Fall/Winter 2021-22 season, the company said. The fashion company follows many other brands in banning fur in recent years including Prada, Versace, Gucci and Armani, due to growing customer sensitivity to animal rights and environmental issues.
The iconic and fashionable villain from 101 Dalmatians, Cruella DeVil may not have been a role model, but the antagonist surely taught us a few things growing up: be kind to animals and fur is evil. And it seems the fashion world is finally trying to keep up. Keeping in mind growing customer sensitivity to environmental issues and animal rights, Italian luxury group Valentino said on Tuesday it would stop using fur from next year and would focus on its main, eponymous brand, ditching its second, younger line from 2024.
The latest Valentino collection to include fur will be the Fall/Winter 2021-22 season, the company said and hopes to go completely fur free from 2022. With increased awareness about how fashion directly impacts climate change and the realization that animal abuse for the sake of fashion is simply inhumane, many celebrities including Dua Lipa, Kim Kardashian, Charlize Theron, Tim Gunn, Pamela Anderson, Simon Cowell, Stella McCartney, Olivia Munn, Ellen DeGeneres, Paul McCartney, Khloe Kardashian and Miley Cyrus have publicly committed to not wear fur.
This has led to many luxury fashion brands to stop including fur in their upcoming collections just like Valentino has vowed to. The fashion company controlled by Qatari investment vehicle Mayhoola follows many other brands in banning fur in recent years including Prada, Versace, Gucci, Burberry, Chanel, Ralph Lauren and Armani. In 2018, Gucci publicly vowed to stop using fur in its future collections, while Prada debuted fake fur in its Spring-Summer 2020 womenswear collection. Many brand's are moving towards using fake fur in a bid to promote sustainability, although real fur advocates claim that real fur is more sustainable than fake fur as per media reports.
Valentino Chief Executive Officer Jacopo Venturini, who joined the Italian group last year when the luxury goods industry was hard hit by the pandemic, decided also to stop collections for its younger label RED Valentino. Speaking about Valentino's sole creative director Pier Paolo Piccioli, Venturini said in a statement, “The aesthetic vision of our creative director — combined with the artisanal spirit and excellence of the workmanship — harmonizes perfectly with new technologies and future objectives.” He continued to explain why Valentino was planning on focusing only on its main brand, saying, “The inputs to which our customers, or friends of the house, are exposed to every day are many. In this scenario, the concentration on one, and only one brand, will better support a more organic growth of the Maison.”
According to Women’s Wear Daily, Venturini also shared the brand's future plans in light of the recent developments, saying, “Maison de Couture for us means creativity, uniqueness, intimacy and an inclusive mind-set. The fur-free stance is perfectly in-line with the values of our company. We are moving full-steam ahead in the research for alternative materials in view of a greater attention to the environment for the upcoming collections.”