Celebrating wildlife free fashion at Melbourne Fashion Week
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Thanks to your support, Melbourne Fashion Week recently strengthened its policies to ensure their runways remain fur and exotic free, so that more wild animals are protected from the cruel and unnecessary fur and exotic skin trade.
In celebration of this, we hosted a Wildlife Free Fashion pop up with Collective Fashion Justice as part of the Melbourne Fashion Week 2022 program.
More than 200 fashion lovers, joined us to celebrate a wildlife-free fashion future, as we showcased innovative collections from Unreal Fur, Sans Beast, Zette Shoes and Noskin.
Emma Hakansson, Founder and Director, Collective Fashion Justice said:
“Such a diverse range of models, designers, stylists, influencers and fashion lovers joined us to celebrate wildlife-friendly fashion. This reflects the attitude of most consumers, who no longer accept the exploitation of wild animals for garments, shoes and accessories.
“As the global industry begins to shift beyond not only fur, but exotic skins and feathers too, Melbourne Fashion Week is taking the lead, with a more progressive policy than most others around the globe. We look forward to this progress only continuing.”
Across the world, different cities showcase work of designers and their upcoming collections in runways events during their respective fashion weeks. Citing concerns for animals and the environment, some global fashion weeks have implemented policies which ban showcasing animal-derived materials.
Melbourne Fashion Week is one of the few showcases in the world to ban both exotics and fur - with only Helsinki and Stockholm Fashion Weeks doing the same.
Disappointingly, of the four major international shows - London, New York, Milan and Paris - just London has banned fur. And there are currently there are no fashion week events which have banned any kind of exotic feathers.
Suzanne Milthorpe, Head of campaigns, ANZ for World Animal Protection said:
“We were thrilled to have been invited by M/FW organisers to be part of this year’s independent program to showcase what we see as the future of fashion – ethical, and wildlife-free.
“Melbourne Fashion Week is leading the way by banning fur and exotic skins on their runways - we would like to see Afterpay Australian Fashion Week follow their lead. We are also urging all shows, including Melbourne, to ban the use of feathers from next year, taking them off their runways, and leaving them on the animals, where they belong. This would truly make Australia a global leader in ethical fashion.
The fashion industry must ask itself whether it will be a leader to protect wild animals, biodiversity and the planet, or if it will continue to profit from their harm and destruction.
A kinder, more humane, environmentally responsible and safer fashion industry is not only possible but exciting, creative and inevitable.
Together we can end the exploitation of wild animals for coats, bags and shoes.
A kinder, more humane, environmentally responsible and safer fashion industry is not only possible but exciting, creative and inevitable.