The Council of Fashion Designers of America, which owns and organizes the Fashion Calendar for New York Fashion Week, said Wednesday that it will no longer promote animal fur at any Official NYFW Schedule events, including on its Fashion Calendar, social media channel and website.
As a continuation of past program collaboration, the news follows years of engagement with Humane World for Animals and Collective Fashion Justice.
Beginning with the September 2026 New York Fashion Week, the CFDA will no longer permit animal fur in collections on the Official NYFW Schedule. This timeline is expected to give designers space to adjust their materials and show plans.
Farmed or trapped fur from animals killed specifically for their pelts — including but not limited to mink, fox, rabbit, karakul lamb, chinchilla, coyote, and raccoon dog — is not allowed. An exemption applies only to animal fur obtained by Indigenous communities through traditional subsistence hunting practices.
Leather and shearling are not part of the ban, according to the CFDA.
The CFDA will support designers through this transition and continue to provide resources on alternatives.
To help align NYFW designers with this new position, the CFDA is committed to offering educational materials and a material library so they can explore different materials.
This position aligns with London Fashion Week, which ended its promotion of fur in 2023, as well as fashion weeks in Copenhagen, Berlin, Stockholm, Amsterdam, Helsinki and Melbourne. Earlier this year, Condé Nast, owner of Vogue, Vanity Fair and Glamour, banned animal fur in editorial content or advertising, following similar policies from Elle and InStyle magazines.
“There is already little to no fur shown at NYFW, but by taking this position, the CFDA hopes to inspire American designers to think more deeply about the fashion industry’s impact on animals. Consumers are moving away from products associated with animal cruelty, and we want to position American fashion as a leader on those fronts, while also driving material innovation,” said Steven Kolb, chief executive officer and president of the CFDA.
Emma Hakansson, founding director of Collective Fashion Justice, said, “The CFDA has further cemented its position as a leading, innovative fashion council on the global stage by formally moving beyond unethical and unsustainable animal fur. At Collective Fashion Justice, we hope Milan and Paris fashion weeks will follow the CFDA and British Fashion Council’s lead, with our support.”
“We applaud the CFDA for using its unique influence on American fashion to help usher in a fur-free future. It’s policies like that that are paving the way for material innovation that will create a cleaner, more humane fashion industry without sacrificing creativity and beauty,” said PJ Smith, director of fashion policy at Humane World of Animals.
PETA’s director of media relations Moira Colley, responding to the CFDA’s decision, claimed: “It’s official: Fur is dead. No kind shopper will wear it, no trendsetting designer will use it, no major fashion magazine will feature it, and now New York Fashion Week won’t show it. This is a win for many thousands of wonderful animals and for the tens of thousands of PETA supporters who rallied for this ban, with the next step being for NYFW to ban all skins, as no animal deserves to be bludgeoned, electrocuted, and their own coats stolen off their bodies for a belt or a bag.”
Taking a different viewpoint, American Fur Council executive board member Kim Salvo said, “Whenever a fashion entity denies the ability to promote all fashion, especially those fashions that utilize a natural product — they are no longer in the business of fashion. In a global world of imitations and synthetics, fast fashion needs to take a seat on the back burner, and the fashion industry needs to return to the spotlight the use of natural materials that have worked from the dawn of time. Fur fashions do just this. With the development of regulatory breeding on fur ranches, the global Furmark certification labeling program and the conservation efforts of trapping — fur is the right direction to promote fashion.”
Salvo said that the CFDA is succumbing to the pressure of animal activists, “who violate the ability of companies to do business by threatening and harassing them through protests and other vile tactics.”
Suggesting that the CFDA is “taking a bad turn by abolishing fur fashions, especially those using wild furs,” Salvo claimed that in North America, wildlife biologists “will attest that populations thrive when habitats are regulated, and trappers know this best. The false narrative pushed by well-funded NPOs needs to stop and if you are looking for sustainability — fur is the way to go.”
As a board member and advocate of The American Fur Council (AFC), the largest industry organization, Salvo said, “We stand behind our product, the artisan craft it entails and the versatile natural products we utilize. The fur industry has been a vital part of the fashion industry for decades in New York City. We continue to provide jobs to trained craftsmen and specialized workers such as designers, patternmakers, factory workers and sewers.
“My professional career spans over 30 years and I can attest that women love fur, myself included. And if you do not, no one is pressuring you to wear it. Fur is everlasting. Nothing will keep you warmer or make you feel more stylish. Fur is fashion and if the CFDA takes this path — sadly they are not,” said Salvo.
In recent years, PETA protesters have frequently disrupted Coach’s fashion shows during NYFW to protest the brand’s use of leather and exotic skins. Last February, one PETA protester was removed from the venue by a team of security guards, as reported.
A PETA protester holds a sign reading “Coach: Leather Kills” as she demonstrates on the runway during the Coach spring 2024 show during New York Fashion Week.
AFP via Getty Images
At Lands’ End’s annual shareholders’ meeting last May, PETA asked the company when it will replace its wool products from sheep with animal-friendly materials, including cotton blends and Tencel that Lands’ End already uses.
In recent months, animal rights activists ramped up their efforts toward specific companies. In August, for example, animal rights activists protested with bullhorns outside of the home of Vogue’s deputy editor Taylor Antrim. That was said to be one of more than 100 protests that targeted Condé Nast employees and some of the media company’s business affiliates, such as Mattel. During another incident, a man who was identified as a “deaf animal rights activist” was arrested on Sept. 28, during what CAFT (Coalition to Abolish the Fur Trade) described as “a peaceful lawful protest” for disturbing the peace outside of the home of Teen Vogue’s features director Brittney McNamara in Paxton, Mass.
While several major designers and big-name retailers like Neiman Marcus stopped selling animal fur products several years ago, the faux fur apparel business is on track for growth. In 2023, the global synthetic fur market was $371.3 million, and it is expected to reach $863 million by 2033, according to the New York-based research firm Market.us.
