Fur Special: The habit fashion can't break

Although fur is still largely frowned on in Britain, its worldwide sales are increasing, partly through the efforts of a Danish supplier. Susannah Frankel , 'The Independent's fashion editor, wonders how long the UK can hold out

Every time any anti-fur organisation releases a campaign, there follows a rash of articles in the press claiming that fur is more fashionable than ever. And so, last Sunday's papers reported a rise of 35 per cent in sales of fur in the UK last year. The coverage was illustrated by an image – commissioned by Peta (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) – of Sophie Ellis Bextor holding up a skinned fox. In the same week, Peta protesters stormed the catwalks of New York – in particular, a show featuring the fur-sporting Brazilian model Gisele Bundchen. The demonstrators were carrying banners reading, "GISELE: FUR SCUM". Mark Glover, campaigns director at Respect for Animals, which has been busily tarnishing the fur trade's glossy image in this country since 1985, explains that, though clearly well-meaning, such provocative imagery on the part of institutions such as his own may be self-defeating.

"Of course, fur has a high profile every winter," Glover says, "but to some extent – and we're guilty of this, too – anti-fur campaigners stir it up." The figure of 35 per cent hails from the British Fur Trade Association (BFTA), which, Glover points out, not unreasonably, is hardly a neutral source.

The International Fur Trade Federation (IFTF) is a similar organisation and describes itself, somewhat bizarrely, as "the United Nations of the world's fur industry... dedicated to the conservation and welfare of all fur-bearing animals". The IFTF was responsible for the 12-page fur promotions in the September issues of British and American Vogue, featuring coats by everyone from Dolce & Gabbana to Jil Sander and from Roberto Cavalli to Prada.

The BFTA issued a press release at the time, congratulating its sister organisation on its efforts. "Worldwide fur sales are expected to comfortably exceed $10bn this year," it read, "spurred on by a massive advertising campaign launched by the IFTF." Just as it is Peta's and Respect for Animals' job to promote a negative image of the fur trade, organisations such as the BFTA and IFTF work extremely hard and invest a huge amount of money to persuade the world that fur is fashionable once more.

But is it? "In Europe, fur has never really gone away," Glover argues, and it is true that the autumn/winter collections in Milan, in particular, and to a lesser extent in New York and Paris, too, have always provided the opportunity to showcase increasingly sophisticated techniques in the handling of animal skin. For those who prefer their dead animals not to look like dead animals, fur is shaved and dyed every colour of the rainbow. Less shy and retiring fashion fur-consumers won't be disappointed, either. The full-length, full-on variety is still supplied by everyone from Fendi – perhaps the most famous Italian fur house – to Givenchy, which features far more fur than it used to but is making up for lost time with everything from fur jackets and coats to bags positively weighed down with fox tails.

What is more surprising is the claim that the British, once vehemently opposed to the wearing of fur, are coming round to it again. The argument goes that the press in this country, formerly at least careful about carrying fur advertising, can no longer afford to be so principled. Celebrity endorsement in London, meanwhile, has never been so high-profile, with everyone from Kate Moss to Madonna proud to flaunt fur. "That's because they're given it," says Glover, matter-of-factly.

Still, at London fashion week, in February, Julien Macdonald showed more fur than has ever before been seen on a British catwalk. Even the supposedly cool, cult label House of Jazz featured fur gilets and sky-high boots from which large fox-fur pom-poms bounced brazenly. Hazel Robinson, one half of the House of Jazz design team, defends her position thus. "As I see it, House of Jazz is a designer, luxury label. The most luxurious thing you can have in a collection, along with rich embroideries and beading, is fur. I don't have an issue with it. I'm not a vegetarian and I wear leather shoes."

Ethical viewpoints aside, as a fairly new, independent label, House of Jazz is hardly rolling in cash or indeed the raw materials needed to come up with its clothes. With that in mind, Saga Furs of Scandinavia has been only too happy to step in. The Denmark-based company, which boasted a turnover of $1bn last year and produces 66 per cent of the world's mink and 61 per cent of the world's fox, has done more to re-establish fur on designer catwalks – and that includes London catwalks – than would recently have been imaginable. At the autumn/winter London collections alone, Saga gave both the fur itself and the technical expertise to turn it into designer garments to Julien Macdonald, Markus Lupfer, Russell Sage, Robert Cary-Williams and, of course, House of Jazz.

In 1988, the fur company – a coalition of Scandinavian mink and fox farmers – opened a research centre outside the Danish capital, with the aim of reintroducing fur into fashion. Since that time, it appears to have done just that. As well as providing fur to all the aforementioned British designers, Saga has also supplied London fashion colleges including the Royal College of Art and Central Saint Martins, ensuring that it targets emerging talent early. Its workshops have been attended by the design teams of Christian Dior, Versace and Max Mara, to name just three. Tom Steifel-Kristensen, Saga's director of global communications, told The Independent in March: "These days we are looking at fur in a new way, in three dimensions. The workshop is dedicated to experimenting, finding the endless design possibilities with fur and pushing the material into the 21st century."

Heady words – and powerfully influential ones, to boot. In the early Nineties, a designer with the status of, say, Alexander McQueen – avant-garde, innovative, iconoclastic – would never have seen working with fur as part of his remit. Saga has successfully worked at dispelling fur's bourgeois, middle-aged connotations, to the point where these days, seduced by its beauty and potential, he may well, as may the younger generation of designers coming up behind him.

We all know, however, that what is seen on the catwalks is seldom wholly indicative of what will arrive, six months later, in store and is even less reliable in determining what the consumer on the street will actually be wearing. While international labels such as Prada and Christian Dior may carry fur in their collections, and indeed in their European and American shops, in Britain fur is still nowhere near so prevalent. According to Respect for Animals, in 1985 there were 200 retail outlets in the UK dedicated to the supplying of fur; today there are a mere 25. Harvey Nichols sells only items that are a by-product of food production, as does Selfridges. Shops such as Fendi may choose to display fur in their windows, but they do so at their peril. Anti-fur protesters are still highly active, targeting the outlets of designers known for their regular use of fur.

Such protest is, of course, hardly inviting to those considering wearing the stuff, who are still more likely, in the end, to be reminded that there is something distasteful about their choice of garment – something ostentatious and vulgar – than to be congratulated and/or respected for their status. The British fashion industry may choose to turn a blind eye, but fur is still only rarely worn in this country in public. For every Kate Moss, there's a Sadie Frost, who, unlike her friend, is passionately opposed to the wearing of fur. With her husband, Jude Law, she made an anti-fur film for Respect for Animals, which was broadcast at cinemas at the end of last year. For every Alexander McQueen, there's a Stella McCartney, who, although owned by Gucci, which clearly has no qualms about using fur in its collections, at least refuses to use fur, or even leather, for her own line.

Glover, for his part, says that any perceived growth in the fur market and in fashion fur in particular is a result of clever marketing over and above a new-found relaxation of ethics where the British are concerned. "The problem we have is in people's perception of fur and the way it is hyped up," he says. Fur-trade organisations have worked "a very slick, well-funded campaign to convince us that fur is back in fashion."

He points out, however, that it will be illegal in this country, as of the end of this year, to farm animals predominantly for the value of their skin, a business that the Government has deemed "morally repugnant". For most of us, then, the farming of fur for fashion is still symbolic of man's arrogance and cruelty, and the wearing of fur carries with it a deep-rooted sense of shame.