The Clothed Body

Intertextual Strategies and Mythology
however, were then, and still are today, loyal to the small, trusted manufacturer,
and the role of handmade production (as opposed to industrial
production) is still more substantial here than in any other clothing sector.
The furrier is still trusted today, both because clients wish to follow the
production of a garment from start to finish and because a fur coat is still
an item which, for the average customer, will have to last and will thus
need to be adjusted and altered as the body changes shape. Only a skilled
artisan can guarantee such long-term service.
From the 1970s the ‘class’ protest against the fur coat began to be
accompanied by protest from the animal protection leagues. It became ever
clearer that, as in other sectors, the relation between the production of
goods and the conservation of nature and its equilibrium was getting out
of control. If people in the coldest parts of the world had been able to wear
fur coats for centuries without endangering the survival of animal species,
mass production, for a market not motivated solely by necessity, put at risk
the lives of species on the brink of extinction, if not already extinct. There
are places where a fur coat is by no means a luxury, but simply a climatic
necessity that padded jackets or ‘ecological’ furs can substitute only up to
a point. The absurdity of our times is that the indiscriminate slaughter of
animals has upset an equilibrium which had existed in such places for
thousands of years.
There are laws and international conventions that protect certain wild
animals from being hunted, and this has enabled some species to recover;
however, it is well known that poaching is widespread, especially in countries
whose economy is traditionally based on the exportation of furs.
Fendi and other designers are always telling us that their furs come exclusively
from fur farms, but this argument, albeit true and well documented,
seems less and less sufficient to convince us that fur coats are ‘harmless’.
Even some models have refused to wear furs, thereby lending support to
the moral of that famous advertisement in which a fashion show exhibiting
furs is transformed into a blood bath.
There is no doubt that the once popular dream of having ‘a mink on
your skin’ must today measure itself against the current perception that
this wave of blood is a reality, not just a theatrical scene. Some indication
of a change in mentality can be seen in the increase in sales of classic wool
coats and jackets padded with goose down or made of synthetic leather.
Even sheepskins are an issue for the radically pro-animal organizations:
sheep might not be wild or on the brink of extinction, but they are animals
nonetheless!
At the first sign of winter the first furs (fewer and fewer today) appear
on the streets of a warm Italy: a ritual garment in the wardrobes of elderly
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