Both Donna Karan and DKNY are set to go fur-free in 2019, according to an announcement from Humane Society International.
Morris Goldfarb, CEO of G-III, Donna Karan and DKNY’s parent company, revealed the decision on Thursday in a Fourth Quarter and Full Year Fiscal 2018 Earnings Conference. The company came to its decision due to its relationship with the Humane Society of the United States.
“HSI is delighted that since Gucci declared fur to be ‘out-dated’ designers have been racing to prove their relevance by dropping the archaic material,” Wendy Higgins, HSI’s Director of International Media, said in a statement. “In the latest designer declaration, this mornings brands DKNY and Donna Karan pledged to ban fur cruelty from their collections.”
In October of last year, Marco Bizarri, CEO of Gucci, claimed that the brand no longer felt that the use of fur was modern. “Do you think using furs today is still modern?” Bizarri asked Business of Fashion. “I don’t think it’s still modern and that’s the reason why we decided not to do that. It’s a little bit out-dated.” Just last week, Donatella Versace, head of Italian designer label Versace, announced it too, was dropping fur. “Fur? I am out of that,” she told The Economist’s 1843 magazine. “I don’t want to kill animals to make fashion. It doesn’t feel right.”
Furthermore, at the beginning of this week, the city of San Francisco made history by banning the sale of fur. G-III’s decision “[marks] the end of a fantastic week for fur-bearing animals,” stated Higgins. “With each new fur-free announcement, designers like Fendi and Burberry that are still putting cruelty on the catwalk fall further out of fashion.”
Additionally, last week, over thirty British celebrities, including Bill Bailey and Dame Judi Dench, banded together to ask the British government to ban the import of fur following Brexit. “Britain’s responsibility to animals does not end at our borders, but extends globally, to those animals killed to be traded into our country. With that in mind, we write to urge your government’s action to ban the import and sale of animal fur in the UK.”
Image Credit: DKNY
