Breaking: PETA Disrupter Crashes Fendi Fashion Show With Anti-Animal Skin Message
Milan – Because Fendi is one of the last major fashion houses to still use fur – and the brand also makes garments out of crocodile and calf leather among the skin of other animals – today a PETA supporter stormed the runway of its show at Milan Fashion Week with the words “Wear Your Own Skin” written across her chest and “Turn Your Back on Animal Skins” on her back, holding a sign that read, “Animals are Not Clothing”. See video footage of the runway takeover here.
“Behind every fur gilet, crocodile-skin bag, or calf-leather shoe is a vulnerable animal who felt pain and fear and didn’t want to die,” says PETA Vice President Mimi Bekhechi. “PETA is calling on Fendi and all other brands at Milan Fashion Week to replace archaic and environmentally destructive animal skin with luxurious, sustainable vegan materials, which are better for animals and the planet.”
A PETA Asia investigation found workers at facilities that supply LVMH, Fendi’s parent company, cutting live crocodiles’ necks open and ramming metal rods down their spines while they were still conscious. A PETA exposé of the global leather industry found that animals are exposed to the elements and denied food and water during gruelling journeys to abattoirs, where their throats are slit. Turning animal skin into leather requires up to 170 unique chemicals – including cyanide, aluminium, and chromium. Animal agriculture, which includes the leather industry, is one of the leading contributors to the climate catastrophe.
PETA entities have also documented how the fashion industry suffocates and electrocutes animals for their fur, brands calves in the face, chops conscious lizards’ heads off with machetes, and forces terrified ostriches into stun boxes before slitting their throats.
PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear” – notes that sustainable vegan leather made from apples, cork, corn, grapes, mushrooms, pineapples, or tea, which mimic the properties of leather without the cruelty to animals or environmental devastation, are readily available on the market.
The action follows another PETA disruption in Milan in September, when an activist crashed the Gucci runway with the message to “Ban Exotic Skins”.
PETA opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk or follow the group on X (formerly Twitter), Facebook, TikTok, or Instagram.
Contact:
Sascha Camilli +44 (0) 20 7923 6244; [email protected]
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