Fashion plays a significant role in culture’s creation and evolution. It has always been about more than the physical garments themselves; it has also been about what ideas and expressions they represent: who we want to be. Our human values of justice and equality deserve to be manifested through the creative ways we dress ourselves, inevitably benefitting rather than taking from people, our fellow animals, and the planet we share.
Yet today, the exploitation and ultimate slaughter of animals, and so a denial of their autonomy, safety, and right to life, is rife in fashion. It is inherently connected to the plundering of our planet and human exploitation.
But there is a future of fashion in which we are more creative and responsible than this. In which people, our fellow animals and the planet alike are prioritized over profit. it is a Total Ethics Fashion future. This future is also more inventive and creative.
Through material innovation, we can move beyond exploitation and destruction. Carefully grown and traditionally used plant materials, upcycled and recycled, bio-based, microbial, and cellular materials can clothe us in the future, styled with our existing and vintage clothing that we continue to care for and love – instead of animal-derived, fossil fuel-based, and native deforestation-driven materials which cause immense harm.
The only animals in this editorial are those whose eyes you see looking back at you.
All of the garments—both vintage and made by designers and brands free from animal inputs. They also all help the fashion industry shift beyond fossil fuel inputs and deforestation-driven materials, which is essential.
Rather than a sheep skin coat, a BioFluff shearling made entirely from plants is worn alongside sheep Shilo and Alina, who live at Tamerlaine Sanctuary and are now free from harm. Knitwear made from native Peruvian cotton, organic cotton, and Tencel is styled with the coat.
Emma wears a BioFluff plant-based shearling coat, organic and native Peruvian cotton knitwear from Mila.Vert and Quispe from Paz Lifestyle, Mara Hoffman bustier (Tencel and organic cotton), Sentient bag (made from plastic-free MIRUM), GANNI boots (recycled rubber), and Pamela Love jewelry (recycled metals).
Next to Cashew the cow and, made from plants rather than skin, are pants and a jacket made from shiringa bio-leather. This is made from regeneratively collected tree sap made by Indigenous Amazonian communities. Another jacket is made from Desserto’s partly cacti-derived leather material, a belt made from plastic-free MIRUM cinches the waist, while boots made with waste from the apple juice industry touch the green grass. The textured, speckled bag is made from cork, a material that is also taken from trees without harm to them (even helping them to sequester more carbon).
Emma wears Mozhdeh Matin pants and jacket (Indigenous shiringa rubber), Vegan Tiger jacket (Desserto’s partly cactus-derived leather), Sylven New York boots (partly apple-based leather), Murmali bag (natural cork), Brave GentleMan belt (MIRUM), and jewelry from Pamela Love (recycled metals) and Allbright Fashion Library.
While live plucking persists in the down industry, the industry’s only alternative is to take feathers from slaughtered birds, killed at a fraction of their natural lifespan.
Pressed against and warming the feathered body of Paddles the duck is a jacket filled with FLWRDWN, a material just as insulating as down but made from wildflowers and bio-gel.
Paddles wears feathers and Emma wears a PANGAIA jacket made with FLWRDWN from wild flowers, with Mozhdeh Matin knitwear and skirt (Peruvian cotton, shiringa bio-leather), Stella McCartney bag (partly made with wine waste biomaterial) and Pamela Love earrings (recycled metals).
The fur industry relies on the unsustainable factory-farm caging and killing of animals specifically for fashion, whose furs are then chemically processed
Inspired by without taking from the rabbit, is a vintage Calvin Klein faux coat.
Plastic-free, bio-based and recycled fur alternatives are increasingly available and developing, and an array of vintage, animal-free fur can continually be used for circular fashion.
Emma wears vintage Calvin Klein faux from albright FASHION LIBRARY, Made for a Woman dress (natural raffia), and Misahara recycled metal jewelry.
The cashmere industry’s growth has degraded many native grasslands across Mongolia and impacted some of the communities who rely on them, while exploiting and later slaughtering goats.
Recycled materials construct a coat featured behind a goat, rather than cashmere born from their exploitation.
Waste-diverted cotton and recycled Brazilian plastic waste compose Brave GentleMan coats and blazers, worn alongside Reformation bottoms (organic cotton), COMME des GARÇONS tulle pants and earrings from New York Vintage, and Sylven New York heels (AppleSkin).
Wiley the peacock is mirrored in volume, movement and intrigue not by plucked feathers, but technical fabric manipulation – brought to life in Tencel, a lyocell material made from responsibly sourced wood pulp.
While many birds are legally protected from use in fashion, ostrich feathers are commonly used, and peacock feathers are also considered decoration, despite both causing similar harm to animals as fur.
Emma wears a Mara Hoffman dress (Tencel and organic cotton), Swedish Stockings tights (recycled synthetics), AERA shoes (denim) and pre-2015 bangles from Alexis Bittar.
The idea of a fashion future where each garment, shoe, and bag tells a story we are excited to share—not only in its concept but also in its physical crafting—is a deeply appealing one. When we commit to dressing ourselves only in materials we would be proud to see made—from start to finish—that reality comes closer to us.
Slaughterhouses, mines, deforested lands, factory farms, and sweatshops are intentionally kept out of sight from us, but they live on in what is made from them. When we dress with consideration of the beauty of craft, not only final creation, we can curate our own wardrobes and physical presentation while also curating landscapes and even our own more just and fair social system for all—no matter which species.
–Emma Hakansson
Emma Hakansson is the founding director of Collective Fashion Justice and the author of Total Ethics Fashion
Executive production by Alexi Lubomirski
Creative direction, production and modelling by Emma Hakansson
Photographed by Emily Teague
Production assistance from Amy Hitchenor
Styling by Robyn Victoria Fernandes with assistance from Alana Powell and responsibility guidance from Collective Fashion Justice.
Animal testing and ingredient-free hair and makeup by Ben Shervin and Dotti.
Photographic crew Ed Singleton and Casanova Cabrera.
Prop support from Dominique Baynes.
With gratitude to Tamerlaine Sanctuary for allowing us to photograph the animals in their care, all rescued from exploitation.
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