"Status Fur" by FENDI FW 2012/13

FENDI Fall/Winter 2012/13 by Karl Lagerfeld 

More fur is flying than ever this winter. The use of leather, reptile, and all kinds of 

animal pelts is so embedded in fashion now that it’s often hard to tell which material is which, 

or even to distinguish between what’s real and what’s fake. It’s safe to say, of course, that it’s all real 
at Fendi, Italy’s premier fur house, where luxurious techniques are at their most sophisticated. 

For fall, Karl Lagerfeld and Silvia Venturini Fendi treated all the materials at 

their disposal as an interplay of textures, colors, and angular shapes, cutting them into 

waisted silhouettes, with skirts patch-worked from asymmetric zones of cashmere and pleats. 

“Modern femininity without references,” describes Lagerfeld. The peplum and the bustle 

are featured in a navy crocodile skirt, with a panel of accordion pleating in the derriere, 

and in a nipped-waist antelope suit with an upstanding feathery “tail” perking up in the back

 of the jacket. Other coat silhouettes were clean and straight up and down; one in matte 

laser-cut navy leather, another in glossy maroon, with a slice of geometric pleating in 

one flank. The new Fendi bags are either iPad boxes with a top-handle, or 

classic-seeming black-and-white crocodile totes save for the fact that they had 

cascades of goat hair sprouting from the sides.

Standing back, though, what’s worth noticing is just how far the idea of  

a “status fur” has shifted since the days of floor-length minks and sables were flaunted by 

Hollywood stars and old aristocracy. They’re nowhere to be seen now. Attribute that to the 

rise of extreme fashion, sought out by a twenty-first century global generation of internationally 

wealthy young people who want their luxury full-on, colorful, and playful. Fendi’s crazy-colored 

yellow goat hair and multicolored patch-work coats speak directly to them.

Photo Credit/Source: © VOGUE
Photography by © Marcio Madeira/firstView
Candids by © Kevin Tachman