Just a warning: today’s post is going to be quite wordy. I don’t have any pretty pictures to show you so if you'd rather not read here's one of my favourite Issey Miyake collections from 2005 (back when Naoki Takizawa was designing). Either way, enjoy.
Last week for our Leather and Materials Tech class we met up at the offices of Pan American Leathers, an exotics tannery with offices in New York and tanneries near Albany and Saratoga. Since I started design accessories (before coming to FIT) I had always had the opinion that I would use a skin if it was an animal that I ate. Since I've learned more and more about these materials my feelings have begun to change. I'm not necessarily going to start making masses of croc bags but I may have some ostrich or caiman used in my designs. I have always been firmly against the unnecessary use of animals for fashion. However I really wanted to keep an open mind whilst in class in order to learn as much as possible. I had always thought that as a designer it's up to me to design a great textile to use in order to stick to my morals.
One of the things we learned was that all the exotics we saw that day were bi-products of the food industry of the various countries the animals came from. This means that caiman, alligator, ostrich even the stingrays and snakes are all eaten by locals. If these skins were not used in the leather industry they would be thrown away, as once was the case down in the southern parts of the US where alligators are considered a delicacy, and the skins were just chucked! Obviously not every animal used in the fashion industry is a bi-product (look at mink) however if the animal is farmed for both its meat and skin I don't see why it necessarily is bad to use in one's designs. After all cow, lamb, pig and goat leather are all bi-products of the food industry. I'm not a vegetarian or vegan and I do eat meats so in terms of ethics I don't mind using most kinds of leather (environmental concerns are another matter). I’m still on the fence on using exotics, as the skinning process wasn’t explained as deeply as I’d have liked. Part of much of the outcry of the use of exotics is how some of the animals are skinned. When I get to a decision as to whether or not I would use these skins I will let you know with a valid argument to boot. In the mean time I’ll be starting to register for my spring classes over the next couple of weeks. I’ve taken a great interest into digital textile design and how it can be incorporated into accessories. Maybe in the future we can develop a printed and embossed crocodile, for now I’ll be sticking with bovine leather.
Last week for our Leather and Materials Tech class we met up at the offices of Pan American Leathers, an exotics tannery with offices in New York and tanneries near Albany and Saratoga. Since I started design accessories (before coming to FIT) I had always had the opinion that I would use a skin if it was an animal that I ate. Since I've learned more and more about these materials my feelings have begun to change. I'm not necessarily going to start making masses of croc bags but I may have some ostrich or caiman used in my designs. I have always been firmly against the unnecessary use of animals for fashion. However I really wanted to keep an open mind whilst in class in order to learn as much as possible. I had always thought that as a designer it's up to me to design a great textile to use in order to stick to my morals.
One of the things we learned was that all the exotics we saw that day were bi-products of the food industry of the various countries the animals came from. This means that caiman, alligator, ostrich even the stingrays and snakes are all eaten by locals. If these skins were not used in the leather industry they would be thrown away, as once was the case down in the southern parts of the US where alligators are considered a delicacy, and the skins were just chucked! Obviously not every animal used in the fashion industry is a bi-product (look at mink) however if the animal is farmed for both its meat and skin I don't see why it necessarily is bad to use in one's designs. After all cow, lamb, pig and goat leather are all bi-products of the food industry. I'm not a vegetarian or vegan and I do eat meats so in terms of ethics I don't mind using most kinds of leather (environmental concerns are another matter). I’m still on the fence on using exotics, as the skinning process wasn’t explained as deeply as I’d have liked. Part of much of the outcry of the use of exotics is how some of the animals are skinned. When I get to a decision as to whether or not I would use these skins I will let you know with a valid argument to boot. In the mean time I’ll be starting to register for my spring classes over the next couple of weeks. I’ve taken a great interest into digital textile design and how it can be incorporated into accessories. Maybe in the future we can develop a printed and embossed crocodile, for now I’ll be sticking with bovine leather.
2 comments:
Honey, you've taken to the blogosphere like a fish to water! Glad to have a good friend here in the big bad internet world!
Also, feel pretty much the same about exotics, but they sure are pretty. Especially stingray.
xx
Tiffany
Thanks Tiff, I love that we can be super geeky together. Which only makes us slightly less geeky (because we're doing it together now(I really have lost my train of thought)). Anywho, wish I could come to the Halloween party but I'm stuck at home doing midterms (Hec is also cooking up something delicious in the kitch!). XX
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