Fur's history

Fur is the oldest and most traditional material in history of clothes. It was already worn by primitive people. Today, it became not just a symbol of luxury and riches, the public status and prosperity. Today it is subject to all fashionable tendencies and trends, as well as everything that surrounds us. From season to season, not only a fashion on kinds of fur, but also the fashion for ways of its processing, dyeing, printing and combination varies. Today absolutely everything is made of fur - handbags and footwear, subjects of interior, bed-clothes, and many other things. Therefore, the fur fashion demands very rapt attention to itself.
During an epoch of the Middle Ages, fur was an important part of a suit. Woods of the Europe teemed with wild beasts - to catch a marten, a fox, a beaver or a sable did not represent any complexity. Representatives of the higher classes wore marten and ermine. Middle class - fur of a beaver, an otter, a hare and fox. Then the fur of northern squirrel was started to be used. From fells greater sheets were collected, and fur was sold in such form. Tailors worked with these sheets, as with a usual fabric. Demand for fur was enormous. For example, Isabella Bavarian used more then fifteen thousand fells for furring of her clothes. The fur prey and trade were a precisely debugged system.
Russian fur had a long history before it became an integral part of the world market of fur. Ancient rusichi used furs in their household as warm clothes in cold winters, and soft couches for sleep. Fur in Ancient Russia was an important compound of economic activities: fells of sable, marten, beaver and other fur animals played a role of monetary unit. It was possible to pay off with fur for any goods, training, religious service. Trading and the customs duties, penalties, taxes were collected with fells.
The facts of Russian history when valuable furs served as the established form of gathering of taxes were known. So, for example, in 883 the conqueror "Prophetic Oleg" had imposed the drevlyan nobility with a tribute a "black marten" from the house.
Another important mode of existence of fur in Russia was a gift. Princes and grandees gave valuable furs for "good deeds". Fur always was one of the best gifts. In solemn and holiday days fur and fur products - fur coats, caps – were presented to members of princely families, priests, notable visitors, ambassadors of foreign states. Value of fur was so great, that merchants and grandees handed them down from generation to generation. Fur was one of the major compounds of marriage portions of rich brides.
Fur is the oldest and most traditional material in history of clothes. It was already worn by primitive people. Today, it became not just a symbol of luxury and riches, the public status and prosperity. Today it is subject to all fashionable tendencies and trends, as well as everything that surrounds us. From season to season, not only a fashion on kinds of fur, but also the fashion for ways of its processing, dyeing, printing and combination varies. Today absolutely everything is made of fur - handbags and footwear, subjects of interior, bed-clothes, and many other things. Therefore, the fur fashion demands very rapt attention to itself. During an epoch of the Middle Ages, fur was an important part of a suit. Woods of the Europe teemed with wild beasts - to catch a marten, a fox, a beaver or a sable did not represent any complexity. Representatives of the higher classes wore marten and ermine. Middle class - fur of a beaver, an otter, a hare and fox. Then the fur of northern squirrel was started to be used. From fells greater sheets were collected, and fur was sold in such form. Tailors worked with these sheets, as with a usual fabric. Demand for fur was enormous. For example, Isabella Bavarian used more then fifteen thousand fells for furring of her clothes. The fur prey and trade were a precisely debugged system. Russian fur had a long history before it became an integral part of the world market of fur. Ancient rusichi used furs in their household as warm clothes in cold winters, and soft couches for sleep. Fur in Ancient Russia was an important compound of economic activities: fells of sable, marten, beaver and other fur animals played a role of monetary unit. It was possible to pay off with fur for any goods, training, religious service. Trading and the customs duties, penalties, taxes were collected with fells. The facts of Russian history when valuable furs served as the established form of gathering of taxes were known. So, for example, in 883 the conqueror "Prophetic Oleg" had imposed the drevlyan nobility with a tribute a "black marten" from the house. Another important mode of existence of fur in Russia was a gift. Princes and grandees gave valuable furs for "good deeds". Fur always was one of the best gifts. In solemn and holiday days fur and fur products - fur coats, caps – were presented to members of princely families, priests, notable visitors, ambassadors of foreign states. Value of fur was so great, that merchants and grandees handed them down from generation to generation. Fur was one of the major compounds of marriage portions of rich brides.

In X-XI centuries, fur becomes an important element of trade with neighboring countries for rusichi. And, not only merchants, but also boyars with princes were engaged into trade in fur. During this period, Kiev Russia actively traded in fur with countries of the East and with Byzantium. For the two next centuries, merchants had also laid trading ways to the countries of the Western Europe.
The basic goods of the Middle Ages were martens, beavers, wolves, foxes, squirrels, hares. At that, trade was carried out mainly in fur brought from territories, which belong nowadays to modern Ukraine and Belarus.

In XV-XVI centuries, the Russian fur brought from Moskovia, owing to the Ukrainian and Polish merchants, gains popularity in Moldova, Walachia, on Balkan Peninsula, in Turkey, Italy, and the Netherlands – being named as "the Moscow furs".
The glory of fur empire was promoted by development of Siberia, which was fantastically rich with valuable kinds of fur animals. Joining of this sable paradise to Russia in XVII century had helped to strengthen positions of Moskovia in the world markets of fur, and to make "soft raggery" the visiting card of trading Russia, and Russia itself - the greatest supplier of fur. Russian state has kept this role down to the end of XIX century when the USA and Canada have joined it in the world market of fur.

XX century
Development of fur fashion was affected with the advent of cars. Walks in opened auto demanded warm and smart clothes. Long-haired furs came into fashion - traditional fox, and together with it there also appeared new ones: mountain goat, bear, raccoon, and wolf. During jazz 20-s, fur of wild monkeys, which was often simulated with mountain goat, was far popular. Children's furcoats were also sawn out of goat. In the end of 60-s, together with Afghani embroidered sheepskin coats, short fur coats of goat and Mongolian llama came into fashion. In the middle 90-s, when luxury was not in honor, Italian fur company Marni had staked on inexpensive furs and started processing goat for youth models. Recently, designers turn to this fur even more often. For winter 1998-1999, Charles Lagerfeld in his collection Fendi presented short coats of cashmere with outstretched "plumelets" of goat fur. In 2000, Alexander McQueen had offered suits with puffed sleeves of mountain goat.

XXI century
The twenty first century, with its discoveries and high technologies, has transformed fur beyond recognition. And today, we treat even the most expensive fur without sacred trembling, almost as a usual fabric. Today, there are no restrictions for fur - it is worn as evening and sportswear, combined both with traditional natural fabrics, and with synthetic materials. And all this is possible owing to continuous studying of fur and invention of new technologies for its processing: shearing, plucking, burning out with an acid, curling, new ways of connection and sewing together, incrustation and embroidery. All this leads to that fur becomes more and more similar to various fabrics, it is used in the most incredible situations down to furniture and subjects of interior. New technologies allow not only to change the texture and structure of fur, to facilitate and soften it, but also to change the approach to designing clothes, change forms and volumes of fur things. Indisputable leaders of the movement for updating and improvement of fur are Saga Furs Scandinavia, Fendi and Blackglama.