When choosing your clothing, it’s easier than ever to avoid animal products and make cruelty-free fashion choices.  Vegan fashion no longer means having to sacrifice style, durability, quality and practicality, as more and more options are developed made from plants.

Clothing and accessories made from hemp and bamboo, along with common fabrics such as cotton and polyester, are readily available.  Choosing organic or recycled materials can help reduce your environmental footprint further.

It’s particularly important to avoid animal leather, which is usually made from the skins of cows, but can also be derived from the skin of pigs, sheep, snakes, horses and more.  It’s made through a lengthy process in which the animal skin is heavily salted, soaked in calcium oxide, tanned (often using chromium) and then put through a liquoring method which includes adding fats and oils to the leather to make it softer and stronger. In addition to the need to raise and then kill the animals to make animal leather, this process is resource intensive and damaging to the environment, particularly when chromium is used.

New creative “leathers” can be made from cork, mushrooms, pineapple leaves, apple peels, and other fruit waste, along with recycled plastics. These are softer and more sustainable than the cheap PVC-based leather alternatives that have been around for many years.

In addition to avoiding leather, there are now substitutes available for other animal based fabrics such as wool, silk, down and of course, fur. While there are already many specialty brands available online, as mainstream brands recognize the popularity of providing vegan selections, you can expect to see more fashion choices become available.