S7. E17: Kym Canter: House of Fluff
“I put on the coat. I looked at myself in the mirror. I was going to a party in Brooklyn, and I just thought, ‘you cannot go to this party like this, you will be shunned and you don't want to be this person.’ I took off the coat and I never looked back.” – Kym Canter
Kym Canter is the founder and creative director at House of Fluff, a New York City-based, animal free, material innovation studio and outerwear brand. They also happen to make some of my favorite faux fur coats on the planet.
All of their products are made from cruelty-free sources. Their fur products are also vegan, because in addition to not using animal fur or leather, their furs do not contain wool or silk.
Most faux furs contain non-biodegradable fibers such as polyester and acrylic, so when using recycled fibers made from these virgin synthetics, House of Fluff makes sure that they meet the Global Recycled Standards (GRS) and are sourced from post consumer waste.
And, to begin solving for virgin synthetics, House of Fluff launched the first of their BIOFUR™ innovations in November 2020. All textiles in their BIOFUR™ collection are recyclable and made from either plant-based or 100% recycled materials.
Back in the day, in another lifetime, Kym was the creative director at J. Mendel, a global luxury brand known for its animal furs. Kym's transformation is one of the best stories I've heard in a long time.
Please listen and share.
In gratitude,
Elizabeth Novogratz
Learn More About House of Fluff
Like on Facebook
Follow on Instagram
Transcript:
Kym: [00:00:15] I put on the coat, I looked at myself in the mirror. I was going to a party in Brooklyn and I just thought, you cannot go to the party like this, you will be shunned and you don't want to be this person. I took off the coat and I never looked back.
Elizabeth: [00:00:36] Hi, I'm Elizabeth Novogratz, this is Species Unite. We have a favor to ask, if you like today's episode and you have a spare minute, could you please rate and review Species Unite on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts? It really helps people to find the show. This conversation is with Kym Canter, the founder and creative director at House of Fluff, a New York City based animal free material innovation studio, and they're an outerwear brand. They also happen to make some of my favorite faux fur on the planet. Back in the day and another lifetime, Kym was a creative director at Jay Mendel, a global luxury brand known for its animal furs. Kym's transformation is one of the best stories I've heard in a long time. I am a huge fan of House of Fluff, and it's very cool of you to be here, so thank you.
Kym: [00:02:55] You’re welcome.
Elizabeth: [00:01:56] So, before we get into today and before we get to House of Fluff and any of what you're doing now, I want to go back. You have one of the better stories of someone who ended up as the queen of faux fur. Let's go back, because you're an old school New Yorker, old school fashion industry. So, can we just kind of talk about firstly how it all started, how did you get into fashion?
Kym: [00:02:19] I have been in fashion for over 20 years. Ok, now my age comes out. I started out at the magazine back in the day when there were magazines and people read magazines. I was at L. I wrote a column for The Wall Street Journal. I was at The Washington Post magazine doing the magazine section. I was a stylist. I worked with Beyonce and Jennifer Lopez and all these stars doing a lot of cosmetic gigs and stuff. So it's very common if you're on that side of the business to then freelance for brands, right? As a sort of secret consultant, helping them know what they should be making. So, I ended up switching to the brand side and building a small luxury brand known for making the finest fur coats in the world. So I was, needless to say, the biggest fur person in New York City, always into fur. I just want to say, I grew up in the seventies, right and in the 1970’s, anyone who's listening that's my age is going to get this. It was completely fine to adopt your pets from the Humane Society, love animals, eat meat for dinner and your mother got a mink coat, like that was just all culturally acceptable behavior with no hypocrisy.
Elizabeth: [00:03:50] Well, when I was a little kid in the eighties, my mom sold furs and more than one. At one point we were living in Germany at the time and she worked for this fur guy and sold furs. My parents had never had any money, and now she could afford furs. I was horrified to be very honest. But for her it was the best thing. It was literally like she'd made it, you know, in a lot of ways and she was so excited. I remember she got a Nookie, which is a Japanese raccoon dog. Then later, she ran the first salon at Macy's when we moved back to the U.S, I was even more horrified. But she thought it was, I mean, that was the world.
Kym: [00:04:31] That was glamor. These were such status symbols. I mean not to jump so far forward to House of Fluff, but it was really important when I switched teams to try to remake some iconic codes. I always believed that what I was really doing with House of Fluff was reinventing modern luxury to be about animal free, innovative and sustainable products. But for sure, at the time we grew up fur was a huge status symbol.
Elizabeth: [00:05:06] Yeah, absolutely. Ok, so at this point you're working at Jay Mendel's?
Kym: [00:05:10] Yes, I'm creative director and building the business and I'm seeking like a Roman emperor, seeking out the most exotic of all animals. One day I made a miniskirt out of the bellies of an alligator. It costs like $7000, crazy stuff.
Elizabeth: [00:05:30] What are you thinking at the time, when you're so involved? You see animal product after animal product, are you thinking, these are animals? What's the mindset?
Kym: [00:05:39] No, so you're just thinking it's a fabric. For some reason to me it was either a stuffed animal I associated with, like a plush animal. I didn't see sadness in it. I honestly don't know why, but I just associated it with a plush, or something crazy like that. It took me a really, really long time. It started very slowly. It started with my household products and food. You know, that's how my awareness of sort of what I was putting in my body and what I was like cleaning my house with in cosmetics. Then, eventually my closet could not escape the scrutiny, right? I put on many contemporary furs, but I also would buy many vintage furs to use as inspiration. One day, I was going to a party in Brooklyn and I put on my favorite fur coat and this is horrible, I'm just going to say it. Shut your ears if you're squeamish. I had a monkey coat.
Elizabeth: [00:06:46] Oh my god.
Kym: [00:06:50] I had a long haired monkey coat, it looked like a long hair goat. You know, it was very long haired and like a rock star, but it actually was a monkey. I put on the coat, it was my favorite coat and I just looked at it. I loved winter, I mean, any chance to wear the leopard, the ocelot, you know, I was down with it.
Elizabeth: [00:07:09] How many furs did you have?
Kym: [00:07:12] I had a lot of furs. I sold twenty six of them to fund my business.
Elizabeth: [00:07:14] Wow.
Kym: [00:07:15] So I had a lot of furs. Anyways, I put on the coat. I looked at myself in the mirror. I was going to a party in Brooklyn and I just thought, You cannot go to this party like this, you will be shunned and you don't want to be this person. I took off the coat and I never looked back. The next day, I went shopping to try to find replacements because those were my winter coats. I couldn't find anything that felt chic, sophisticated and luxe. So I thought, well, I'm just going to have to make myself something. I mentioned that to a bunch of my girlfriends, like at brunch or something two days later and they all turned to me and said, Oh my God, if you're not going to wear fur, make something for us. I realized, oh my God, there's other women that feel the same way, and there's just nothing for them, no alternative for them to go to.
Elizabeth: [00:08:13] So what were the alternatives at the time? It was a lot of kid looking stuff, right?
Kym: [00:08:18] Cheap stuff, even from Zara. It had a very plastic feeling and the fur just felt bad. If it was vintage, it felt really bad, really cheap and the styles weren't right. I mean, there was just nothing, I was a snob. Listen, I came out of high luxury, I mean, I thought there's got to be something in between real fur and this bad fake fur. So, that became the mission.
Elizabeth: [00:08:47] Because there wasn't anything out there. How do you even start this then?
Kym: [00:08:51] Well, so now I realize there's a marketplace, right? There's a lot of people that want this, it seems to me. So I went to the design director at Jay Mendel, where I was working, who I thought was the most talented designer working with fur. Alex Dimmock is his name, and I said, Alex, I want you to make me a fur coat, but a non-animal fur coat. Actually, I think I might want to start a non-animal fur brand. What do you think? Luckily, Alex's sister had been a vegetarian and it had been this huge thing in his family that she saved animals and he slaughtered animals to make clothes. So he was like, Oh my God, yes. So, as soon as I had my design, we realized, there's no reason some of these seamstresses that we've worked with for years and pattern makers, can't move over to animal free. So then we had the staff, then we needed money. I sold the coats to get the seed money. That's when we just started looking actually for fabrics. That sort of became another huge thing because many of the fabrics that we found being used at the time during twenty seventeen were filled with polyester and acrylic and things that were not really great for the Earth.
Elizabeth: [00:10:20] Sure.
Kym: [00:10:21] So, that started pillar number two at the House of Fluff, which is, we know we can do this without animals, but can we do this in a sustainable way, that will be making a product that also won't harm the Earth? So in twenty seventeen, no one wanted to talk about any of these issues. I mean, you could barely find a recycled box or bag to send a product out. We started making our own garment bags from canvas to send the product, so we didn't have to use plastic. Then you could keep it forever. I mean, it's really been a road.
Elizabeth: [00:10:56] They’re cool bags, actually.
Kym: [00:10:58] Yes, so it's been a great process. As far as launching the brand, I feel that there were many people at that moment in Twenty Seventeen, if you remember Gucci, Versace, all these big heritage brands went fur free, right around the time that we launched. I mean, I think there was a lot of momentum in that direction. There was one that had been in need in the marketplace that had been growing for sure. Women really responded, men also. I think that it was a real pivotal turning point in understanding the culture and the way we're going to move forward.
Elizabeth: [00:11:49] Right, right. I know that so much of the faux fur not that long ago was kind of crap, right? But was there also this push from the fur industry to, say, don't wear faux fur?
Kym: [00:12:05] I am so glad you brought this up because this is one of my favorite topics? Ok, so the fur industry, for anyone that doesn't know, is very rich, right? I mean, it's made up of these farmers all over the globe who have a lot of money. When they started to feel threatened by people turning away from fur, they started a massive ad campaign that basically came out and said, real animal fur is natural fur. It is totally natural, and faux fur is harmful to the planet and terrible for the environment and natural fur, natural fur. They put billboards in Times Square. They had ads in every magazine, many of which were banned. The science states otherwise, even with the faux fur having polyester in it, animal fur is still more hazardous to the Earth because of CO2 emissions, because of runoff from the animal farms, it's terrible from all of the chemicals that are used to dye the skins. I mean, it's really like pollutants on pollutants, and never mind the animal welfare issue.
Elizabeth: [00:13:26]. And the disease ,and the COVID.
Kym: [00:13:32] Yeah, I mean you can't even compare some polyester, which is in so many clothes. But the fur people made enough noise to put that messaging out there, that many people did start to believe it.
Elizabeth: [00:13:47] I was hiking with someone this weekend and I was telling her that I was coming to see you, and I was talking about House of fluff and what you're doing and biodegradable fur. She was like, thank God somebody is doing it because the faux fur is so shitty for the environment, the whole kind of spiel. And yes, you know, there's truth in little truth. But it was totally coming from what you're talking about, right?
Kym: [00:14:08] I mean, listen, it's like the bully, they had a very loud voice. It's like Trump, it's fake news. If you can say it loud enough and you can say it enough times. There are people that will believe it. So yes, that was a problem. I mean, I didn't want to start a brand, and I felt the big win was always creating an alternative that won on everything, right? So yes, we're going to save animals, but we also need to care about the Earth, and we always set out to make a luxury product. We came from Jay Mandel, we're not messing around. I mean, we were making coats from tiwalls. We're having several fittings. These are coats that we're making in our studio. They're extremely well thought out. The first few coats were copies of my vintage coats, pretty much. Everything was extremely thought out and was a quality product that we believe you would have for a very long time. We would be willing to take it back and make it into a pillow or a blanket, or a vest or something, if you don't want it.
Elizabeth: [00:15:21] I wore your green cape, the green furry cape, to a lunch not that long ago, and there were like eight women there and everyone was like, Oh my God. Usually, I mean, I have a lot of faux fur because I feel like it's part of my job and I can say, oh it's vegan, and then it encourages people.
Kym: [00:15:38] Of course.
Elizabeth: [00:15:39] But every single person there wanted to take photos of the tags so they could look up your stuff.
Kym: [00:15:45] That Cape was actually when I had been at Mandela. I had made myself a mink cape and it was very chic. I wanted to wear that cape again. So it was just like, Let's make my mink cape, all over again.
Elizabeth: [00:16:03] What was the reaction from people who knew you as the fur woman to now you're making faux fur? How do people respond?
Kym: [00:16:12] I think people were so intrigued by the story, and everyone that knew me just couldn't believe it. It was a great story, we got lots of press. There was lots of interest. I think it was also proved to many people that there was an industry. I went to many meetings with the Humane Society and the city of New York, proving to them that the fur industry and people in the fur industry could find jobs in the fashion industry because in fact, everyone that worked for us had worked in fur. So I think there were many sides to it. You know, for us, we did great things. We ended up doing all the furs for the Elton John movie Rocketman.
Elizabeth: [00:16:55] You did?
Kym: [00:16:56] Yes, it was so good of them that they chose to remake all of Elton's furs in faux, instead of using anything real. So we did that, we had an incredible celebrity ask for furs. I think because I think no one wants to wear real fur anymore.
Elizabeth: [00:17:25] No, no, no.
Kym: [00:16:56] There was just nothing for them to wear that they felt good in. All of a sudden, we showed up with this luxury cool kind of product that felt a little edgy and it felt really good. If anything, people would say, Well, can you put a tag on the outside of this that says it's faux fur because it looks so real? We were such sticklers on the quality. It's the way of the future. It was very organic of us just putting it out there in the world and the world, saying, Oh, yeah, like now this is what we want, this is what we've been missing. Maybe we didn't even realize it. So that sort of led us to then try to figure out how to make it even more earth friendly, even more sustainable.
Elizabeth: [00:18:15] Will you talk a little bit about what’s in it? I don't understand what any of this is really made of to begin with. What's in, say, a Zara fake fur versus your original versus where you want to go, how does that shift and what's the trajectory?
Kym: [00:18:32] So yeah, all really good questions because these are all very mysterious questions. There are some good and bad answers, the reality is you kind of have to get to good on the way to great, right? So the issue is a lot of the faux fur has polyester in it, which helps to give the fur sheen. It helps it to be long lasting, it helps it to have fire retardancy and helps it to have a lot of qualities. There's also another bad thing called mode acrylic, which is similar to a polyester. Why they're bad is that they both come from a petroleum base and a petroleum base takes like five hundred years to decompose. So, that is actually why they're bad. It's an afterlife issue. So we always intended to make things that would last forever. The road for us has been, we first started trying to replace it with recycled poly. It's like, OK, if we got to use it, let's not make anymore. Let's just reuse what's already in the world. That was sort of fair enough. Then it was like, OK, well, can we figure out how to make a bio based fur? Certain furs like hemp, if you've ever seen a type of fur that's made from hemp, it's completely natural. It will biodegrade. It's sort of close to fur. So maybe we can figure out a bio base for this and that that's really been the real road that we've gone down. To date, we've figured out how to replace about 40 percent of what's in the fur with bio based ingredients. We still have to add the recycled poly.
Elizabeth: [00:20:36] How does this happen? Are you in a lab?
Kym: [00:20:38] It happens in that kind of way. I talked to scientists a lot. We're continually trying things to try to replace as many ingredients as we can. We've been able to add or combine an additive. There are a lot of people on the eco side that don't like additives. But the additive basically helps the polyester to break down, it is like microbes. It makes the microbes react and will eat the recycled polyester if it should hit a landfill or the ocean. So, it's not perfect because there are still traces of micro fibers, but it's way, way better.
Elizabeth: [00:21:25] Well, that's the thing. I mean, this is kind of everything in the solutions world. So everything we had, somehow everyone thinks is natural. A lot of people are saying our meat is natural. It's jacked up with antibiotics and all sorts of crap. There's nothing natural about it. That's the same with the fur world, same with the leather world, because we're so conditioned to think the old way, that somehow it’s a very natural, organic way of doing things. Now all this future stuff is kind of scary. Whereas all these things, whether it be in fashion or food, all this innovation, no one's going to get it perfect in the world. In infancy, in so many of these worlds. If you ask me, if you take out the cruelty, that's a huge win and then taking out all these other things, it takes time.
Kym: [00:22:16] No for sure, like I said we've taken out the cruelty. We're making a product. We're careful, a lot of the issues is if you're going to bother to try to make something that's going to biodegrade, you better make sure you put a lining in it that can biodegrade. You better make sure that you have a zipper or snaps that can biodegrade, right? Then also don't wrap it in plastic. I mean, this is like a big thing to think about. So, we're doing all of those things. We're trying to make a product that you'll keep for years in your closet. You know, nothing's going to happen to it. So keep the fur, keep it in its cloth garment bag, take care of it, and wear it for many years. Give it to someone or send it back, we'll make you pillows or a blanket. Or, you know, we pick up all the scraps from our workroom floor and we make these plush collectibles called Satrapi's. There's a giant one over there we have for our magazine.There's a million things you can do with it, we can make animal toys, with the fur byproduct. We try to do as much as we can do. We're working on the actual textiles. I think that is a huge win, it's just going to take time.
Elizabeth: [00:23:31] It's funny because when you say, back in twenty seventeen, twenty seventeen, to me, it feels like it was seven minutes ago. It doesn't feel that long ago that none of this was really happening, right?
Kym: [00:23:43] That's what's so crazy, when you think about how sustainability is just an overused word, right? There's this crazy amount of greenwashing, it's just nuts. In 2017, when I went looking for faux fur without polyester, people laughed in my face or just didn't even want to talk to me. Now, there are many more people that want to have the conversation, but there aren't really that many solutions.
Elizabeth: [00:24:23] Right, but you're getting there?
Kym: [00:23:25] I feel we've definitely improved the composition of the product without sacrificing the look and the warmth.
Elizabeth: [00:24:27] Are other people following you? As in following your lead or are other companies starting to shift toward what you're doing?
Kym: [00:24:35] There's another mill that's been working on development of a more sustainable fur, and we use similar things and different things and I think that a lot of brands can buy fur from them. The problem is they greenwash a little bit. In marketing stuff, people don't understand things, and it's hard to really explain what's in your product. You have sort of limited time to do that and people gloss over it. So I would say to anyone that's listening to really be careful what you hear and really look at the labels and to ask questions of the brands and other retailers where you're buying the product. I think there are people that say a lot of things and maybe don't walk the walk and talk the talk.
Elizabeth: [00:25:37] So, yeah, it's like an easy cheat. People can cheat at it.
Kym: [00:25:40] You can say anything. This is made from anything. I think that's a real problem because you get people like me who've spent a year making something legitimate, really good and proper and really earth friendly. Already, people are like, Well, but I've had biodegradable fur for three years, it's bullshit.
Elizabeth: [00:26:05] And you're like, No, you haven't. It doesn't exist.
Kym: [00:26:10] Exactly, exactly. So I mean, yeah, that's definitely there's truth in that, but that's across many fibers.
Elizabeth: [00:26:19] Yeah, one hundred percent since you had the moment of transformation in the mirror and the monkey fur. No, but seriously.
Kym: [00:26:27] It was a dark past. I am repairing my karma from all those years.
Elizabeth: [00:26:32] I know. I love that you're doing that. I love it, trust me. Since you had that moment, has it shifted your life in other ways, too?
Kym: [00:26:43] I feel like it reinforced a lot of my issues with food and made me look differently at other animal products in my life. It started with me with cleaning products, believe it or not. I went to a talk that Tata Harper gave and it was all about what we clean our house with, deodorant and all these personal products and how they could be giving us cancer and are harmful things. That was my very first thing. Then I started looking at everything and it just became a process. It definitely made me more aware of what I eat, I think those things are very connected. I think the closet and the food are very connected.
Elizabeth: [00:27:36] I love your story. I love your coats. I love your hats.
Kym: [00:27:41] Thank you very much. We just made a hat out of our mink. I really wanted to make an iconic mink, mink coat and everything, and just kind of in a funny way. We actually made a mink bucket hat for the U.S. Olympic ski and snowboard team, it was really great.
Elizabeth: [00:28:02] Wow, that's incredible.
Kym: [00:28:04] So I think that's really great too.
Elizabeth: [00:28:05] I mean, if you don't count China and a couple of other places, the world really is going fur free.
Kym: [00:28:11] One hundred percent and I don't see that this will change back in any way because it's just gone too far. When you start to get retailers and then countries banning farming, it's huge. Retailers will have no place where they can sell the product. Those two things are really, really huge. Never mind that the customer doesn't want to wear it, because that can change also with messaging and trends and stuff like that. Huge, huge change. I also do want to say this because people ask me this all the time. If you do have a fur because you've been given vintage fur or you've inherited one or whatever reason that you have a fur and you don't know what to do with it and you don't want to wear it. There are several animal charities, I think there used to be one that was Coats For Cub, and another one was Born Free. Almost any animal shelter you can take your fur and use it for poor, orphaned animals, which I think is the best case scenario.
Elizabeth: [00:29:22] I love that. It's awesome. Kym, thank you so much for today.
Kym: [00:29:30] Thanks for coming over. We should try on some furs.
Elizabeth: [00:29:33] Oh, why don't we?
Elizabeth: [00:29:44] To learn more about Kym and to learn about House of Fluff, go to our website Species' Unite.com. We will have links to everything. We're on Facebook and Instagram @SpeciesUnite. If you have a spare minute and could do us a favor, please subscribe, rate and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts. It really helps people find the show. If you'd like to support Species Unite, we would greatly appreciate it. Go to our website SpeciesUnite.com and click Donate. I'd like to thank everyone at species tonight, including Gary Knudsen, Caitlin Pierce, Amy Jones, Paul Healy, Santana Polk, Bethany Jones and Anna Colner, who wrote and performed today's music. Thank you for listening. Have a wonderful day!
You can listen to our podcast via our website or you can subscribe and listen on Apple, Spotify, or Google Play. If you enjoy listening to the Species Unite podcast, we’d love to hear from you! You can rate and review via Apple Podcast here. If you support our mission to change the narrative toward a world of co-existence, we would love for you to make a donation or become an official Species Unite member!
As always, thank you for tuning in - we truly believe that stories have the power to change the way the world treats animals and it’s a pleasure to have you with us on this.